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I 



MAID OF THE MIST 




NOVELS BY THE 

SAME AUTHOR 

RED WRATH 

Cloth, $1.25 net 

THE COIL OF CARNE Cloth, $1.25 net 

QUEEN OF THE GUARDED 

MOUNTS 

Cloth, $1.25 net 

JOHN LANE 

COMPANY 

Publishers 

New York 



MAID OF THE MIST 


JOHN OXENHAM 
#1 


NEW YORK 

JOHN LANE COMPANY 
MCMXIV 



Copyright, 1914, by 
John Lane Company 



m !8 m 

a 


©CI,A3T4500 


6 


TO 

MY FRIEND 

FREDERICK C^SAR de SUMICHRAST 

Professor Emeritus of French Literature 
at 

Harvard University 
IN 

HIGHEST ESTEEM 
AND 

MOST AFFECTIONATE REGARD 



CONTENTS 




BOOK I 


For A Woman’s Sake 


No Man’s Land 


BOOK II 


Bone of Contention 


BOOK III 


BOOK IV 

Love in a Mist 

BOOK V 


Garden of Eden 



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I 



BOOK I 


FOR A WOMAN’S SAKE 


I 

At sight of where the chase was leading, most of the 
riders reined in their panting horses and sat watching 
those in front with anxious faces. 

The Old Roman Road — so called, though with pos- 
sibly somewhat doubtful claim to antiquity so remote — 
had an evil reputation. At best of times its was dan- 
gerous. More than one of them had sacrificed a horse 
to it at some time or other. Some had come near to 
sacrificing more. 

After several hours in the field, wound up by a fast 
five-and-twenty minutes’ run which had led round 
Endsley Wood and the coppices almost to Wynn Hall, 
and then back through Dursel Bottom, and up Whin 
Hill, it was too much to ask of any horse. Besides, it 
meant the end of the run in any case, for that old fox, 
if he failed to shake them off elsewhere, always made 
for the Roman Road and always managed it there. 

The hedge on this side was as thick and matted a 
quickset as ever grew. The sunk road had no doubt 
originally been a covered way from the old fort up 
above. It was indeed more of a trench than a road, 
with a sheer descent from the quickset of ten good feet, 
d width of about as much, and a grass slope on the 
other side at a somewhat lower level. 

The leap was therefore by no means impossible if 
your horse could rise to the hedge and cover the dis- 
tance and the extra bit for a footing. 


10 


MAID OF THE MIST 


But what was the good? The bottom of the old road 
was always a muddy dribble from the fields above, and 
up and down it went several flocks of sheep whenever 
they changed pasture. And the wily old fox knew the 
effect of these things on scent as well as any hound or 
huntsman. So, when it was his day, and he had had 
enough of them, he made for the Old Roman Road, and 
then went home with a curl in his lip and a laugh in 
his eye. 

But there were riders among them to whom a ride was 
n6thing without a risk in it, and the Roman Road a 
standing test and temptation. It was two such that the 
rest who had got that length stood watching, some with 
tightened faces, none without anxiety. For a leap that 
is good sport when one’s horse is fresh may mean disas- 
ter at the end of the run. Even old Job, the huntsman, 
and young Job, his son, who acted as whipper-in, 
watched with pinched faces and panted oaths between 
their teeth. 

Pasley Carew, the Master, lifted his foam-flecked 
black to the hedge, and the dull crash of his fall came 
up to them, horribly clear on the still autumn air. 

Wulfrey Dale, the Doctor, on his big bay, cleared 
hedge and road with feet to spare, flung himself off as 
soon as he could pull up, and ran back to help. 

It was as bad as it could be. Carew lay in the road, 
smothered in mud and obviously damaged. His horse 
had just rolled off him, and the Doctor saw at a glance 
that one of its forelegs was broken. It was kicking 
out wildly with his heels, flailing clods out of the steep 
bank and floundering in vain attempts to rise. 

Carew, on one elbow, was cursing it with every oath 
he could lay tongue to, and with the pointed bone han- 
dle of his crop in the other hand was hammering the 
poor brute’s head to pulp. 

“Stop it, Carew!” shouted Wulfrey, sickened at the 


MAID OF THE MIST ' 


11 


sight, as he jumped down the bank. ‘Damn it, man, it 
wasn’t her fault !” 

“ her ! She’s broken my back.” 

“You shouldn’t have tried it. I told you you were 
too heavy for her. Stop it, I say!” and he wrenched 
the crop, all dripping with hair and blood, out of the 
other’s hand, and with difficulty bit off the hot words 
that surged in his throat. For the man was broken 
and hardly responsible. 

It was a hard age and given to forceful language. 
But never in any age are there lacking some to whom 
brutality to the dumb beast appeals as keenly as ill- 
treatment of their fellows. 

Wulfrey Dale was of these, and a great lover of 
horses besides, and Carew’s maltreatment of his broken 
beast cut him to the quick. 

With another quick look at the useless leg, and a bit- 
ter word which he could not keep in, at the horror of 
the mauled head, he drew from his pocket a long knife, 
which had seen service on many a field, opened it, 
pressed down the blinded tumbling head with one hand, 
and with the other deftly inserted the blade at the base 
of the skull behind the ears and drove it home with all 
his force, severing the spinal cord. 

“Poor old girl !” he said, as, with a quick sigh of re- 
lief, the great black body lay still. 

Then he turned to Carew and knelt down to examine 
into his injuries. 

“No need,” said the broken man. ‘Curse it all! Get 
a gate. My back’s gone. I’ve no legs,” — and the 
others, having found their roundabout ways, came fiock- 
ing up, while the dogs still nosed eagerly up and down 
the road but got no satisfaction. 

Young Job plied his whip and his tongue and carried 
them away. His father looked at Carew, then at the 
Doctor, who nodded, and the old man turned and hur- 


12 


MAID OF THE MIST 


ried away to get what long experience of such matters 
told him was needed. 

“Take a pull at this, Carew,” said the Doctor, hand- 
ing him a flask. And as he drank deeply, as though to 
deaden the pain of the thought of it. Dale beckoned to 
one of the group which stood a little aloof lest the 
broken man should take their anxiety for morbid curi- 
osity. 

“Barclay, will you ride on and break it to Mrs. 
Carew?” 

“Is it bad?” 

“Yes, his back’s broken.” 

“Good God !” and he stumbled off to his horse, and 
with a word to the rest, mounted and rode away. 

Old Job came back in a minute or two with a hurdle 
he had rooted up from the sheep-fold, and they lifted 
the Master on to it and carried him slowly and heavily 
home. 


II 

Mrs. Carew was on the front door steps as they came 
up the drive. The Doctor went on in advance to speak 
to her. 

“Dead?” she jerked breathlessly, as he strode up. 

“Not dead. Badly broken. He may live,” and her 
tightened lips pinched a trifle tighter. 

She was a slight, extremely pretty woman of three 
and twenty, white-faced at the moment with the sudden 
shock; in her blue eyes a curious startled look — anx- 
iety ? — expectancy ? Even Dale, who had known her all 
his life, could not have said. All he knew was that it 
was not quite the look one found in some wives’ faces in 
similar circumstances, and this was not the first he had 
seen. 

She looked scarcely more than a girl, though she had 
been married five years. That was due largely to the 


MAID OF THE MIST 


13 


slim grace of her figure. Her face was thinner than he 
had known it, less eloquent of her feelings, somewhat 
tense and repressed, and her eyes seemed larger ; and all 
that, he knew, was due to the fact that it was to Pasley 
Carew to whom she had been married for five years, for 
he had seen these changes come upon her gradually. 

They had played together as boy and girl, when he 
was just little Wulf Dale, the Doctor’s son, and she 
Elinor Baynard, living with her mother at Glyne. As 
youth and maiden they had flirted and even sweet- 
hearted for a time. But Mrs Baynard of Glynne had 
no intention of letting her pretty girl throw herself 
away on a mere country doctor’s son, however highly 
she might esteem both father and son personally. 

Wulf had at that time still to prove himself, and even 
if he did so, and eventually succeeded his father in the 
practice, it meant no more than a good living at the 
cost of constant hard work. 

Elinor, she was sure, had been gifted by Nature with 
that face and figure for some better portion in life than 
that of a country doctor’s wife, and so she saw to it 
that the feelings of the young people should not get too 
deeply entangled before it was too late. 

As for Elinor herself she was very fond of Wulf. She 
liked him indeed almost well enough to sacrifice every- 
thing for him. But not quite. If he had only been in the 
position and possessions of Pasley Carew of the Hall, 
now, she would have married him without a moment’s 
hesitation, and she would undoubtedly have had much 
greater chance of happiness than was vouchsafed her. 

If, indeed, Wulf had ardently pushed his suit he 
©flight possibly have prevailed on her to marry him in 
spite of her mother, though whether Wulf without the 
possessions would have satisfied her eventually may be 
doubted. But Wulf, two years older than herself, had 
no intention of marrying at twenty, even if his father 
would have heard of it. 


14 


MAID OF THE MIST 


He was a gay, good-looking fellow, with the cheer- 
fullest of humours, and on the best of terms with every 
man, woman and child, over all the country-side. More- 
over he was an excellent shot, a fearless rider, good 
company at table, an acceptable and much-sought-after 
guest, — whenever circumstances and cases permitted of 
temporary release from duties with which no social en- 
gagements were ever allowed to interfere. Marrying 
and settling down were for the years to come. 

As his father’s assistant he had proved his capabili- 
ties. And when the old man died, Wulf stepped up into 
the vacant saddle and filled it with perfect acceptation 
to all concerned. 

His ready sympathy, and his particular interest in 
and devotion to everyone who claimed his services, en- 
deared him to his patients. They vowed that the sight 
of him did them as much good as his medicines, but he 
made them take the medicines all the same. 

He had also lately been appointed Deputy-Coroner 
for the district, in order, in case of need, to relieve Dr 
Tamplin — old Tom Tamplin who lived at Aldersley, ten 
miles away. So that matters wert prospering with him 
all round. All men spoke well of him and the women 
still better. 

A practitioner from the outside, with a London de- 
gree and much assurance, had indeed hung out his large 
new brass plate in the village about a year before, and 
lived on there in hope which showed no sign of fulfil- 
ment. For everyone knew and liked Wulf Dale, and 
Dr. Newman, m.b., clever though he might be and full 
worthy of his London degree, was still an outsider and 
an unknown quantity, and the way of the medical out- 
sider in a country district is apt to be as hard as the 
way of the transgressor. 

So Elinor Baynard, for the sake of her bodily com- 
fort and her own and her mother’s worldly ambitions, 
married Pasley Carew and became Mistress of Croome, 


MAID OF THE MIST 


15 


and learned all too soon that it is possible to pay too 
high a price even for bodily comfort and the realisation 
of worldly ambition. 

Worldly ambition may, indeed, be made to appear 
successfully attained, to the outside world; but bodily 
comfort, being dependent more or less on peace of mind, 
is not to be secured when heart and mind are sorely ex- 
ercised and bruised. 

Jealous Jade Rumour even went the length of whis- 
pering that it was not heart and mind alone that had on 
occasion suffered bruising in this case. For Carew was 
notoriously quick-tempered and easily upset — and no- 
toriously many other things also. His grooms and boys 
knew the feel of his hunting-crop better than his rea- 
sons for using it at times — though doubtless occasion 
was not lacking. As to his language ! — it was said that 
the very horses in his stables lashed out when he began, 
as though they believed that, by much kicking, curses 
might be pulverised in mid-air and rendered innocuous. 

Now a wife cannot — Elinor at all events could not — 
kick even to that extent under the application of sul- 
phur or riding-whip. Nor can she legally, except in 
the extremest case, throw up her situation, as the sta- 
ble-boys could, but did not. For the pay in both cases 
was good, and for the sake of it the one and the other 
put up with the discomforts appertaining to their posi- 
tions. 

Pasley Carew’s redeeming characteristics were a 
large estate and rent-roll, sporting instincts, and ex- 
treme openhandedness in everything that ministered to 
his own pleasures. 

He ran the hounds and was a fine rider, though over- 
hard on his horses, with whom he was never on terms of 
intimate friendship. He esteemed them solely for their 
carrying capacities. He preserved, was a good shot, 
and free with his invitations to the less-happily situ- 
ated. He was a jovial host and a hard drinker as was 


16 


MAID OF THE MIST 


the fashion. He enjoyed seeing his friends at his table 
and under it. He was not a hard landlord, and this, 
and his generosity in the matter of compensation for 
hunt-damage, secured him the good-will of the country- 
side and palliated all else. 

Morals were slack in those days, and no one would 
have thought for a moment of affronting Carew by 
calling him a moral man. 

On the whole, Elinor paid a somewhat high price for 
the bodily comfort from which — according to the Jeal- 
ous Jade — sulphurous language and an occasional blow 
were not lacking, and for the satisfaction of a worldly 
ambition which, if the gradual shadowing of her pretty 
face was anything to go by, had not brought her any 
great peace of mind. 


HI 

WuLFREY Dale was a very general favourite. With 
men and women alike, quite irrespective of their station 
in life, his manner was irresistibly frank and charming. 
With the women it might be said to be almost unfortu- 
nately so. 

He was so absolutely and unaffectedly sympathetic, 
so exclusively and devotedly interested in every woman 
he met, that it is hardly matter for wonder that in many 
quarters impressionable hearts beat high at his coming, 
and thought tenderly and hopefully of him when he had 
gone. That, too, in spite of the fact that their owners 
knew perfectly well that it was simply Wulf’s way, as it 
had been his father’s before him, and that neither of 
them could change his nature any more than he could 
change his skin or the colour of his eyes. 

He took a deep and genuine human interest in every 
man, woman and child with whom he came into contact, 
and showed it. With men and children it made for 
good-fellowship and extraordinary confidence. The 


MAID OF THE MIST 


17 


older folk all trusted young Wulfrey as they had all 
their lives trusted the old Doctor. The children would 
talk to him as between man and man, and with an art- 
lessness and candour which as a rule obtained only 
among themselves. With the women it led in some cases 
to little affections of the heart — flutterings and burn- 
ings and barely-self-confessed disappointments, for 
which their owners, if honest in their searchings after 
truth, had to acknowledge that the blame lay entirely 
with themselves. 

It was a time of hard drinking, hard riding, and quite 
superfluously strong language, but none the less, among 
the women-folk, of a sentiment which in these days of 
wider outlook and opportunity we should denominate 
as sickly. The blame was not all theirs. 

So far Wulf had shown exceptional interest or fa- 
vour in no direction, that is to say in all, and so none 
could claim to say with any certainty in which way the 
wind blew, or even if it blew at all. 

Not a few held that Elinor Baynard’s marriage with 
Pasley Carew had so wounded his aff*ections that it was 

probable he would never marry, unless . And 

therein lay strictly private grounds for hope in many 
a heart. 

For a heart-broken man, however, Wulfrey managed 
to maintain an extremely cheerful face, and his manner 
to Elinor, whenever they met, was just the same as to 
other women. 

If it had in fact been somewhat different it would not 
have been very surprising. For it needed no profes- 
sional acumen to recognise that her marriage with Pas- 
ley had not fulfilled her expectations. 

She was, indeed, Mrs Carew of Croome, mistress of 
the Hall and all such amenities — and otherwise — and 
luxuries of living as appertained to so exalted a posi- 
tion, winner of the prize so many had coveted, and — 
wife of Pasley Carew. And sometimes it is possible she 


18 MAID OF THE MIST 

wished she were none of these things because of the last. 

For Carew made no pretence of perfection, or even of 
modest impeccability, never had done so since the day 
he was bom, never would till the day he must die, would 
have scorned the very idea. Was he not a man, — rich 
and hot-blooded, able and accustomed all his life to have 
his own way in all things, easy enough to get on with 
when he got it, otherwise when thwarted.^ 

And Wulfrey Dale had seen the freshness of the 
maiden-bloom fade out of Elinor’s pretty face, in these 
five years of her attainment, had seen it stiffen in self- 
repression, and even harden somewhat. Her eyes had 
seemed to grow larger, and there were sometimes dark 
shadows under them. Without doubt she had not found 
any too large measure of the comfort and happiness she 
had looked for. At times, mind acting on body, her 
health was not of the best, and then she sent for Wul- 
frey to minister to her bodily necessities, and found 
that he could do it best by allowing her to relieve her 
mind of some of its burdens. 

They had always been on such friendly terms that she 
could, and did, talk to him as to no other. Her mother 
was worse than useless as a burden-sharer. Her only 
counsel was not to be too thin-skinned, and above all 
to present a placid face to the world. Which, as medi- 
cine to a sorely-tried soul, was easier to give than to 
take, and proved quite ineffective. 

Wulfrey, on the other hand, gave her tonics, and, to 
the fullest limits of his duty to Carew, his deepest sym- 
pathy in her troubles and vexations, and his friendly 
advice towards encouragement and hope of better times, 
when Pasley’s hot blood would begin to cool and he 
would settle down to less objectionable courses. 

At times, under stress and suffering from some more 
than usually immoderate outbreak on her husband’s 
part, she would let herself go in a way that pained and 


MAID OF THE MIST 


19 


surprised him, both as friend and doctor. He doubted 
if she always told him all, even at such times. More 
than once she had seemed on the point of still wilder 
outbreak, and it was all he could do to soothe her and 
bring her back to a more reasonable frame of mind. 

On one occasion she openly threatened to take her 
life, since it was no longer worth living, and it took 
Wulfrey a good hour to wiring from her a solemn prom- 
ise not to do so without first consulting him. So over- 
wrought and alternately excited and depressed was she 
that there were times when, in spite of her promise, he 
would not have been greatly surprised by a sudden sum- 
mons to the Hall with the news that its mistress had 
made a summary end of her troubles. 

His mind was sorely exercised on her account, but it 
was only the effects that came within his province. The 
root of the trouble was beyond his tackling. He. did, 
indeed, after much debate within himself, bring himself 
to the point of discussing the matter, in strictest confi- 
dence, with the parson, one night. But he, jovial 
sportsman and recipient of many bounties from Pasley, 
including the privilege of subsiding under his table 
whenever invitation offered, genially but flatly refused 
to interfere between man and wife. 

‘‘No good ever comes of it. Doctor. You know that 
as well as any man. It’s only the intruder suffers. 
They both turn and rend him like boars of the wood 
and wild beasts of the field. Take my advice and leave 
’em alone. These things always straighten themselves 
out in time — one way or the other. Deuce take the 
women ! They’re not blind kittens when they marry. 
They’ve got to take the rough with the smooth. An- 
other glass of punch before you go !” — was the irrever- 
ent Reverend’s final word on the matter. And Wulfrey 
could do no more in that direction. 


20 


MAID OF THE MIST 


IV 

/ 

It was under such circumstances that they carried Pas- 
ley Carew home to Croome on the hurdle ; under such 
circumstances that Elinor met them on the steps and 
asked Wulfrey, with that curious, startled look in her 
eyes which might be anxiety and might be expectancy, — 

“Dead?” 

And Wulfrey, subconsciously wondering whether she 
really had got the length of hoping for her husband’s 
death, and subconsciously feeling that if it were so it 
was not much to be wondered at, though undoubtedly 
greatly to be deplored, had answered her, somewhat 
sternly, “Not dead. Badly broken. He may live,” — 
for the shock of the wholf matter, and the extreme dis- 
comfort of having had to sever that poor Blackbird’s 
spinal cord, were still heavy on him. 

Elinor shot one sharp, searching glance at his face, 
and turned and went on before the bearers to show them 
the way. 

The staircase at Croome was a somewhat notable one, 
wide enough to accommodate hurdle and bearers with 
room to spare, so they carried the Master right up to 
his own bedroom and as gently as possible transferred 
him to his bed. 

The explosive fury of his outbreak against Fate and 
Blackbird, in the first shock of his fall, had been simply 
a case of vehement passion disregarding, and momen- 
tarily overcoming, the frailty of the flesh. Exhaustion 
and collapse followed, and as they carried him home he 
lay still and barely conscious. 

He came to himself aga^n as they placed him on the 
bed, and after lying for a moment, as though recalling 
what had happened, murmured in a bitter whisper, 
“Damnation ! Damnation ! Damnation !” and his eyes 


MAID OF THE MIST 


21 


screwed up tightly, and his face warped and pinched in 
agony of mind or body, or both. 

As Wulfrey bent over him, and with gentle hands as- 
sured himself of the damage, Carew looked up at him 
out of the depths ; horror, desperation, furious revolt, 
hopelessness, all mingled in the wild gleam that detected 
and scorched the pity in Wulfrey’s own eyes, and gave 
him warning of dangers to come. 

“ it all ! It’s no good. Dale,” he growled 

hoarsely. “I’m done. that horse! Give me some- 

thing that’ll end it quick 1” 

“Don’t talk that way, man! You know I can’t do 
that. We’ll pull you through.” 

“To lie like a log for the rest of my life ! I won’t, I 

tell you. it, man, can’t you understand I’d liefer 

go at once.^” 

“I’ll bring you up a draught and you’ll get some 
rest,” said Dale soothingly. 

“Rest ! Rest ! A dose of poison is all I want, 

you! Don’t look at me like that, your* to his 

wife, who stood watching with her hands tightly clasped 
as though to hold in her emotions. She walked away to 
the window and stood looking out. 

“Carew, you — must — be — quiet. You’re doing your- 
self harm,” said the Doctor authoritatively. 

“Man, I’m in hell. Poison me, and make an end !” 

“Not till to-morrow, anyway. I’ll run down and get 
that draught. We’ll see about the other in the morn- 
ing.” 

Mrs Carew turned as he left the room, and followed 
him out, and the sick man sank back with a groan and 
a curse. 

“Will he die.'^” she asked quickly, as she closed the 
door behind them. 

“Not necessarily. But if he lives he’ll be crippled 
for life.” 

“He would sooner die than live like that.” 


22 


MAID OF THE MIST 


‘We can’t help that. It’s my business to keep him 
alive. I’ll run down and mix him a draught which may 
give him some rest. You’ll need assistance. He may 
go off his head. He’s a bad patient. I’ll send you 
someone up ” 

“Not Jane Pinniger then. I won’t have her.” 

He knitted his brows at her. “It was Jane I was 
thinking of. She’s an excellent nurse, both brains and 
brawn, and he may get violent in the night.” 

“I won’t have her here,” said Elinor obstinately, and 
he remembered that gossip had, not so very long ago, 
been busy with the names of Pasley and Jane, as she 
had at other times occupied herself with Pasley and 
many another. Undoubtedly Elinor had had much to 
bear. 

“All right ! If I can find anyone else ” he began. 

“I won’t have Jane Pinniger here,” — and he went off 
at speed to get the draught and find a substitute for 
Jane if that were possible. 

His doubts on that head were justified. He sent his 
boy up with the draught, and started on the search for 
a nurse who should combine a modicum of intelligence 
with the necessary strength o^ mind and body. 

But his choice was very limited. Old crones there 
were, satisfactory enough in their own special line and 
in a labourer’s cottage, but useless for a job such as 
this. There was nothing for it at last but to go back 
to the Hall and tell Mrs Carew that it was Jane or no- 
body. 

“Nobody then,” said she decisively. “I will manage 
with one of the girls from downstairs, and young Job 
to help.” 

“Young Job is all very well with the dogs ” 

“He will do very well for this too. We may not re- 
quire him, but he can be at hand in case of need,” and 
he had to leave it at that. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


23 


V 

Carew suffered much, more in mind even than in body. 
The thought of lying there like a damned log, as he put 
it, for the rest of his days filled him with most pas- 
sionate resentment, and drove him into paroxysms of 
raging fury. He cursed everything under the sun and 
everyone who came near him, with a completeness and 
finality of invective which, if it had taken effect or come 
home to roost, would have blighted himself and all his 
surroundings off the face of the earth. 

Even his wife, and the maid who took turns with her 
to sit within call, accustomed as they were to his out- 
breaks, quailed before the storm. Young Job alone 
suffered it without turning a hair, and paid no more 
heed to it all, even when directed against himself, than 
he would to the yelping of his dogs. 

Wulfrey Dale came in for his share, chiefly by reason 
of his quiet inattention to the sufferer’s impossible de- 
mands for extinction. 

But he found his visits to the sick-room trying even 
to his seasoned nerves. What it must all mean to the 
tortured wife he hardly dared to imagine. 

Once, when he was there, Carew hurled a tumbler at 
her which missed her head by a hair’s-breadth. Dale 
got her out of the room, and turned and gave his pa- 
tient a sound verbal drubbing, and Carew cursed him 
high and low till his breath gave out. 

“Has he done that before.?” the Doctor asked the 
white-faced wife, when he had followed her downstairs. 

“Oh, yes. But I’m generally on the look-out. I was 
off my guard because you were there. Oh, I wish he 
would die and leave us in peace.” 

“He’ll kill himself if he goes on like this.” 

“He’ll kill some of us first. He’s wanting to die. It 
would be the best thing for him — and for us. Can’t 


24 


MAID OF THE MIST 


you let him die?” and a tiny spark shot through the 
shadowy suffering of her eyes as she glanced up at him. 

“You know I can’t. Don’t talk like that!” he said 
brusquely, and then, to atone for the brusqueness, “I 
am sorely distressed for you, but there is nothing to be 
done but bear it as bravely as you can. What about 
your mother? Couldn’t you ” 

‘It would only make him worse still, if that is possi- 
ble. Pasley detests her. Oh, I wish I were dead my- 
self. I cannot bear it,” and she broke into hysterical 
weeping, and swayed blindly, and would have fallen if 
he had not caught her. 

A woman’s grief and tears always drew the whole of 
Wulf’s sympathy. And he and she had been almost as 
brother and sister all their lives — till she married 
Carew. 

“Don’t, Elinor ! Don’t I” he said soothingly, as with 
her shaking head against his breast she sobbed as 
though her heart were broken. 

Mollie, the maid, came hastily in, without so much 
as a knock, her red face mottled with white fear. 

“He’s going on that awful. Ma’am, I vow I daresn’t 
stop in there alone with him. It’s' as much as one’s 
life’s worth when he’s in his tantrums.” 

“Get your mistress a glass of wine, Mollie, and then 
find young Job and send him up. I’ll go up and wait 
with Mr Carew till he comes.” 

He led Mrs Carew to the couch and made her lie 
down there, and explained matters to the girl by asking 
her, 

“Does he throw things at you too ?” 

“La, yes. Doctor, at all of us, if we don’t keep ’em 
out of his reach. He do boil up so at nothing at all,” 
and she went off in search of young Job, who was pass- 
ing a peaceful holiday hour in the company of thirty 
couple of yelping hounds. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


25 


VI 

Dale was confronted with the problem with which 
every medical man comes face to face during his career. 

Here was a man who, both for his own sake and still 
more for the sake of those about him, would be very 
much better dead than living; who wanted to die, and, 
as he believed, make an end ; who begged constantly for 
the relief of death;— and yet, against his own equally 
strong feeling of what would be best for all^concerned, 
his doctor must do his very utmost to keep his patient 
alive and all about him in torment. 

W^ulfrey wished, as devoutly as the more immediate 
sufferers, that he would die. He wished it more ar- 
dently each time he saw Mrs Carew, and wholly and 
entirely on her account. 

Her white face, which grew more deathly white each 
day, and her woful eyes, which grew ever more despair- 
ing in their shadowy rings, were sure indexes of what 
she was passing through. Dale wondered how much 
longer she would be able to stand it. 

He gave her tonics, and his most helpful sympathy 
and encouragement. And at the same time, by the 
irony of circumstance and the claims of his profession, 
he must do everything in his power to perpetuate the 
burden under which she was breaking. 

But the whole matter came to a sudden and un- 
looked-for end, on the seventh day after the accident. 

Wulfrey was hastening up to the Hall to clear this, 
the unpleasantest item, out of his day’s work, when he 
met young Job coming down the drive with a straw in 
his mouth and three couples of young hounds at his 
heels. 

“Wur comen fur you. Doctor,” said young Job. 
‘‘H^s dead.” 

‘‘Dead.^” jerked the Doctor in very great surprise, 


26 


MAID OF THE MIST 


for his patient had been more venomously alive than 
ever the night before. 

‘‘Ay — dead. An’ a good thing too, say I, and so too 
says everyone that’s heard it.” 

“But what took him, Job.? He was going on all right 
last night.” 

“ ’Twere the Devil I expecs. Doctor, if you ask me 
straight. He were getten too strampageous to live. 
Th’ air were so full o’ fire and brimstone with his curses, 
it weren’t safe. ’Twere like bein’ under a tree wi’ th’ 
leeghtnin’ playin’ all round.” 

“And Mrs Carew.^ . . . Who was with him when he 
died.^ Tell me all you know about it,” as they hurried 
along. 

“I come up at ten o’clock as ushal, an’ the missus met 
me at door wi’ her finger to her lips. ‘He’s sleeping. 
Job,’ she says, an’ glad I was to hear it. ‘I’ll go an’ lie 
down. Job, for I’m very tired,’ she says, and she looked 
it, poor thing. ‘Knock on my door if you need me. 
Job,’ she says, and she went away. He were lying quiet 
and all tucked up, an’ I sat down an’ waited for him to 
wake up and start again. But he never woke, and 
when the missus came in this morning she went and 
looked at him, and she says, ‘Why, Job, I do believe he’s 
dead,’ and I went and looked at him, and, God’s truth, 
he looked as if he might be. But I couldn’t be sure, not 
liking to touch him, and I says, ‘No such luck, ma’am, 
Pm afraid,’ — polite like, for we all knows the time she’s 
had wi’ him, and she says, ‘Go and fetch Dr Dale.’ So 
I just loosed these three couple o’ young uns — they’re 
all achin’ for a run, — an’ I’m wondering who’ll work 
th’ pack now he’s gone, if so be as he’s really gone, 
which I’m none too sure of. Th’ Hunt were best thing 
he ever did, but he were terrible hard on his horses.” 

Dale hurried into the house and up the stair, and into 
the sick-room, the windows of which were opened to 
their widest, as though to cleanse the room of the fire 


MAID OF THE MIST 27 

and brimstone which had seemed over-strong even to 
such a pachyderm as young Job. 

Carew lay there on the bed, at rest at last, as far as 
this world was concerned, startlingly quiet after the 
storm-furies of the last seven days and nights. 

Dale was still standing looking down at him, full of 
that ever-recurring wonder at the quiet dignity which 
Death sometimes imparts even to those whose lives have 
not been dignified ; full too of anxious desire to learn 
how it had come about. v 

The tightly-clenched hands and livid rigidity of the 
body suggested a startling possibility. He was bending 
down to the dead man to investigate more closely w^hen 
a sound behind him caused him to look round, and he 
found Mrs Carew standing there. Her face was whiter, 
her eyes heavier and more shadowy, than he had ever 
seen them. 

“He is dead,” she said quietly. 

“One can only look upon it as a merciful release — for 
all of you. How was it.?” 

“He wanted to die,” she began, in the dull level tone 
of a child repeating an obnoxious lesson. Then the self- 
repression she had prescribed for herself gave way 
somewhat. Her hands gripped one another fiercely and 
she hurried on with a touch of rising hysteria, but still 
speaking in little more than a whisper. “You know 
how he wanted to die. He was asking you all the time 
to give him something to end it. But you could not. I 
know — I quite understand — being a doctor, of course 
you could not. But there was something he kept — for 
the rats, you know, in the stables. And he told me 
where it was and told me to get some. So I got it and 
gave it him in his sleeping-draught, and ” 

“Good God! Elinor! . . .” he gasped. “ ... You 
never did that !” 

“Yes, I did. Why not.? He wished it. We all 
wished it. It is much better so,” and she pointed at the 


28 


MAID OF THE MIST 


dead man on the bed. “It is better for him . . . and 
for all of us. I only did what he told me.” 

He stood staring at her in blankest amazement, and 
found himself unconsciously searching her face and eyes 
for signs of aberration. Her face was wan-white still, 
but had lost the broken, beaten look it had worn of late. 
The shadow-ringed eyes were perfectly steady and had 
in them a curious wistful look, hke that of a child ex- 
pecting and deprecating a scolding. 

“Do you know what it means he asked at last, in a 
hoarse whisper. 

“It means release for us all,” she said quickly, and 
then more quickly still, “Oh, Wulfrey, I couldn’t help 
thinking — hoping that — sometime — not for a long time, 
of course, — but sometime — when we have forgotten all 
this — you might — you and I might ” 

“Stop !” he said sternly. “Were you thinking that 
when you did this.f”’ and he pointed to the bed. 

“Not then — at least — no, I think not. I just did 
what he told me to do. But when I saw he was really 
dead — — ” ^ 

He stopped her again with a gesture, and broke out 
with brusque vehemence, “Is it possible you don’t un- 
derstand what you have done.? Do you know what 
the law will call it.?” — 

“The law.? No one needs to know^ anything about it 
but you and me ” 

“The law will want to know how this man died ” 

“But you can tell them all that is necessary. It was 
Blackbird falling at the old road that killed him. If he 
hadn’t broken his back he wouldn’t have been lying here, 
and if he hadn’t ” 

“He might have lived for twenty years,” he said, 
breaking her off short again with an abrupt gesture. 
“The law requires of me the exact truth. Do you un- 
derstand you are asking me to swear to a lie.? I would 
not do it to save my own life.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


29 


“He took it himself ” 

“He could not get it himself, and the law will hold 
you responsible for supplying it.” 

‘Oh — Wulfrey! . . . You won’t let them hang me?” 
— and he saw that at last she understood clearly 
enough the peril in which she stood if the whole truth 
of the matter became known. 

Hang her they most certainly would if the facts got 
out, or coop her for life in a mad-house, which would be 
infinitely worse than hanging. And the thought of 
either dreadful ending to her spoiled life was very ter- 
rible to him. 

She stood before him, little more tl^an a girl still, 
woful, wistful, with terror now in her white face and 
shadowy eyes, and he remembered their bygone days 
together. 

“Go back to your room, and rest, if you can. And 
say nothing of all this to anyone. You understand? — 
not a word to anyone. I must think what can be done,” 
he said, and she turned and went without a word. 


VII 

Wulfrey Dale thought hard and deep. 

He must save her if he could. 

How? 

For a moment — inevitably — he weighed in his mind 
the question of his own honour versus this woman’s life. 

With a few strokes of the pen he could probably bury 
the whole matter safely out of sight along with Carew’s 
dead body. But those few strokes of the pen, certifying 
that this man died as the result of his accident, were as 
impossible to him as would have been the administra- 
tion of the poisoned draught itself. 

Moreover — though that weighed nothing with him 
compared with the other — there was in them always the 


so 


MAID OF THE MIST 


possibility of disaster, should rumour or tittle-tattle 
cast the shadow of doubt upon his statement; and an 
idle word from Mollie or young Job might easily do 
that. The neighbours also had made constant enquiry 
after Pasley since his accident, and had been given to 
understand that he was progressing as well as could be 
expected. His sudden death might well cause com- 
ment. Indeed, it would be strange if it did not. That 
might lead to investigation, and that must inevitably 
disclose the fact that he died from strychnine poison- 
ing. 

The Dales had never been wealthy, but their stand- 
ards had been high, and Wulfrey had never done any- 
thing to lower them. He could not sell his honour even 
for this woman’s life. 

He pitied her profoundly. He understood her better 
probably than any other. He knew how terribly she 
had suffered, and could comprehend, quite clearly, just 
how she had fallen into this horrible pit. But cast his 
honour to the dogs for her, he could not. 

Then how.?^ 

And, pondering heavily all possibilities, he saw the 
only feasible way out. 

It meant almost certain ruin to himself and his pros- 
pects, but, if it came, it would be clean ruin and he 
would feel no smirch. 

It involved a false statement of fact, it is true, but 
of a very different cast and calibre from the other, and 
one that he himself felt to be no stain upon his honour. 

As a matter of pure thics a lie is a lie, and of course 
indefensible. I simply tell you what this man did and 
felt himself untarnished in the doing. 

And the very first thing he did was to go straight 
home to the little dispensary which opened off his con- 
sulting-room, and alter the positions of some of the 
bottles on the shelves; and from one of them he with- 


MAID OF THE MIST 


31 


drew a measured dose which he tossed out of the win- 
dow into the garden. 

Then he sat down at his desk and quietly wrote out a 
certificate of the death of Pasley Carew, of Croome 
Hall, Gentleman, through the administration of a dose 
of strychnine in mistake for distilled water, in a sleep- 
ing-draught compounded by Dr Wulfrey Dale. And 
he thought, as he wrote the word, of the awful pande- 
monium Pasley Carew, Gentleman, had created in his 
own household these last seven days. 

He enclosed this in a covering letter to Dr Tamplin, 
the coroner, in which he explained more fully how the 
mistake had occurred. The bottles containing the 
strychnine and the distilled water stood side by side on 
his shelf. He had come in tired from a long country 
round. Had remembered the draught to be sent up to 
the Hall. As to the rest, he could not tell how he came 
to make such a mistake. But there it was, and he only 
was to blame. He could only express his profound re- 
gret and accept the consequences. 

Then, having completed his documents, instead of gal- 
loping off to see his waiting patients, he sat down before 
the fire and let his thoughts play gloomily over the 
whole matter. His man was off delivering medicines, 
and would not be back till midday. Time enough if 
Tamplin got his letter during the afternoon. As to his 
own patients, he had run rapidly over them in his own 
mind, and saw that there was no one vitally demanding 
his attention. He could not go his rounds and say 
nothing, and the thought of carrying the news of his 
own default was too much for him. As soon as the mat- 
ter got bruited about, he thought grimly, there would 
probably be a run on Dr Newman’s services, which 
would greatly astonish and delight that gentleman and 
would compensate him for all his months of weary 
waiting. 

It was a good thing for Elinor, he thought, as he sat 


82 


MAID OF THE MIST 


staring into the fire, that he was not married. If he 
had had a wife and children, they must have, gone into 
the scale against her, and she must certainly have been 
hanged. 

Quite impossible to bring it in as an accident on her 
part. That he had seen at a glance. The jury would 
be composed of neighbours, and, in spite of the placid 
face she had turned to the world, it was well enough 
known that she and Palsey had not lived happily to- 
gether. And though the fault of that was not imputed 
to her, every man’s thought would inevitably jump to 
the worst, and condemn her even before she did it out of 
her own mouth, which she most certainly would do the 
moment she opened it to explain matters. 

No, this was the only possible way. If the cost was 
heavy, he was more capable of bearing it than she. In 
any case he could not hand her over to the hangman. 
That was out of the question. 

He could pretty well forecast the consequences. His 
practice would be ruined, for who would trust a doctor 
capable of so fatal a mistake He would have to go 
away and start life afresh elsewhere. It would have to 
be somewhere where he was^ quite unknown, or this thing 
would dog him all his life. Some new country perhaps, 
— say Canada or the States. Gad, it was a heavy price 
to pay for a foolish woman’s lapse ! 

He would not be penniless, of course. His father had 
laid by a considerable sum in the course of his long and 
busy life. If necessary he could live in quiet comfort, 
without working, for the rest of his days. But it was 
hard to break away like this from all that had so far 
constituted his life. A heavy price to pay for mere 
sentiment — but not too heavy for a woman’s life ! 

There was no doubt of his having to go. The ques- 
tion was whether he should go at once, or wait till there 
was nothing left to wait for. 

It would be dismal and weary work waiting. But 


MAID OF THE MIST 


S3 


going would feel like bolting, and he had never run from 
trouble in his life. As a matter of fact he had never 
until now had any serious trouble to face, but now that 
it had come he found himself in anything but a running 
humour. 

If there had been anything to fight he would have 
rejoiced in the melee and plunged into it with ardour. 
But here was nothing to be fought. By his own deliber- 
ate act he was labelling himself untrustworthy, and no 
uttermost striving on his part could rehabilitate him. 
For the essence of healing is faith, and a doctor who 
has forfeited one’s confidence is worse than no doctor 
at all. 

VIII 

In the afternoon he sent off his man on horseback with 
the letter to Dr Tamplin, and towards evening he came 
galloping back with this very characteristic reply : 

“My dear Wuefrey: 

“Shocking business and I’m sorely grieved about 
whole matter. Humanum est errare, but a doctor’s not 
supposed to. Good thing for us we’re not always found 
out. Could you not bring yourself to certify death as 
result of the accident I consider it a mistake to admit 
the possibility of such a thing, so d — d damaging to 
the profession. And have you considered the matter 
from your own point of view.? Cannot fail to. have bad 
effect. Perhaps give that new fellow just the chance 

he’s been waiting for. him ! Think it over again, 

my boy, from all points, and be wise. I return certifi- 
cate. Your man will tell you all about my fall. My 
cob stumbled over a stone last night and broke me a 
leg and two ribs. I’m too heavy for that kind of 

thing and he’s a fool ! But it was very dark and 

we’re neither of us as young as we were. For all our 


34 > 


MAID OF THE MIST 


sakes I hope you’ll come through this all right. We 
can’t spare you. And it might come to that. Remem- 
ber what silly sheep folks are. 

“Yours truly, 

“Thomas Tamplin.” 

Just like the dear, easy-going old boy, fall and all, 
thought Wulfrey, and the advice tendered and the 
course suggested did not greatly surprise him. But he 
had to make allowances for the old man’s age and easy- 
goingness, and his lack of detailed knowledge of all the 
circumstances of the case, — how almost impossible it 
would be to ascribe Carew’s death to the accident, even 
if he could have brought himself to do so. 

The old man’s own shelving would add greatly to the 
unpleasantness of the situation, for, as deputy-coroner, 
he would have to call a jury himself, and submit the 
matter to their consideration and himself to their ver- 
dict. 

However, there was no way out of that, so he set to 
work at once and sent out his summonses, calling the 
inquest for ten o’clock the next morning, at the Hall; 
and to relieve Elinor as much as possible, he gave or- 
ders to the undertaker at Brentham to do all that was 
necessary, and sent her word that he had done so. 

Early next morning, before he was up, young Job 
was knocking on his front door, with half the pack 
yelping and leaping outside the gate. 

“Well, Job.'^ What’s it now.?” he asked, from his 
bedroom window. 

“That^al Mollie says you better come up and see th’ 
missus 

“Why.? What’s wrong with her.?” 

“I d’n know, n’ more don’t Mollie. She thinks she’s 
had a stroke.” 

“Wait five minutes and I’ll go back with you,” and in 
five minutes they were crunching through the lanes, all 


MAID OF THE MIST 


S5 


hard underfoot with frost that lay like snow, and white 
and gay with hedge-row lacery of spiders’ webs in 
feathery festoons, and, up above, a crimson sun rising 
slowly through the mist-banks over the bare black trees. 

“What makes Mollie think your mistress has had a 
stroke?” asked the Doctor. “What does Mollie know 
about strokes?” 

“/ d’n know. ‘Sims to me sh’ve had a stroke,’ was 
her very words. She’ve just laid on her bed all day an’ 
all night without speakin’ a word, Mollie says, — eatin’ 
noth’n, and drinkin’ noth’n, which is onnat’ral; an’ 
sayin’ noth’n, which in a woman is onnat’ral too.” 

“She was quite worn out with nursing Mr Carew.” 

“Like enough. He wur a handful an’ no mistake. 
Th’ house is a deal quieter wi’out him. But who’s goin’ 
to run th’ pack.^^ — that’s what bothers me.” 

“Don’t you worry. Job. Someone will turn up to 
run the pack all right.” 

“Mebbe, but it depends on who ’tis. Why not your- 
self, now. Doctor?” 

“That’s a great compliment. Job, and I appreciate it. 
But,” with a shake of the head, “I’ll have other work to 
do,” and he wondered grimly where that work might 
lie. 

Mollie took him straight up to Mrs Carew’s room, 
where she lay just as she had sunk down on the bed 
when he sent her away the previous morning. 

“She’s niver spoke nor moved since she dropped 
down there yes’day,” whispered Mollie impressively. “1 
covered her up, but she took no notice. An’ I brought 
her up her dinner and her supper but she’s never ate a 
bite.” 

“Get me a cup of hot milk with an egg and a glass of 
sherry beaten up in it, Mollie,” he whispered back. 
“And I’ll see if I can induce her to take it. You did 
quite right to send for me,” and Mollie hurried away 
with a more hopeful face. 


36 


MAID OF THE MIST 


Elinor lay there with her eyes closed and a rigid, 
stricken look on her white face, a picture of hopeless 
despair. But Wulfrey’s quick glance had caught the 
flutter of her heavy lids, and the gleam of terrified en- 
quiry that had shot through them, as they came into 
the room, and he understood. 

He bent over her and whispered, “I have made it all 
right, Elinor. You need have no further fears ” 

‘‘They will not hang me.'^” she whispered, and looked 
up into his face with all the terrors of the night still in 
her woful eyes. 

“No one will know anything about it unless you tell 
them yourself. You will eat something now, and then 
you had better lie still. Get some sleep if you can or 
you will make yourself ill. If you fell ill you might say 
things you should not, you know.” 

She struggled up on to one elbow. “You are quite 
sure they will not hang me.?” she whispered again. 

“Quite sure, unless you are so foolish as to tell them 
all about it.” 

“I have felt the rope round my neck all night. Oh, it 
was terrible in the dark. It was terrible . . . terrible 

” and she felt about her pretty white neck with 

her trembling hands. 

“Forget all about it now. I have made all the neces- 
sary arrangements. There will have to be an inquest. 
It will be held here ” 

“Here.?” she shivered. 

“At ten o’clock this morning. You are too ill to be 
present, so you will just lie still. It will not take long. 
And I have done everything else that had to be done.” 

“It is very good of you,” she murmured, with a for- 
lorn shake of the head. 

She did not ask by what means he had saved her from 
the consequences of what she had done. Perhaps she 
dared not. Perhaps she believed he had, after all, for- 
sworn himself for her sake, and refrained from ques- 


MAID OF THE MIST 


37 


tioning him lest it should only add to his discomfort. 
Anyway she was satisfied with the fact. She was not 
going to be hanged. That was enough. 

Mollie came in with her deftly-compounded cup. 

“Drink it up,” said the Doctor. “I will look in again 
later on,” and he went away to prepare the household 
for the coming meeting in the big dining-room. 


IX 

The sixteen jurymen, whom Wulfrey had summoned in 
order to make qiute sure of a legal panel, came riding 
up in ones and twos, with faces tuned to the occasion, 
disguising, as well as they could, the vast curiosity this 
sudden call had excited in themselves and all their vari- 
ous households. 

That there was something gravely unusual behind it 
they could not but feel. They were all friends and 
neighbours ; many of them had witnessed Carew’s acci- 
dent and had been constant in their enquiries as to his 
progress. The news of his death had come as a sur- 
prise and a shock, and such of them as happened to 
join company on the road discussed the matter by fits 
and starts, and surreptitiously as it were, but did not 
venture below the surface. Their women-folk at home 
had done all that was necessary in that respect for the 
fullest ventilation of the subject, without in any degree 
rendering it more savoury or comprehensible. 

Every man had felt it his bounden duty to be there, 
and so it was sixteen keenly interested faces that con- 
fronted Wulfrey when he took the chair at the head of 
the table and stood up to speak to them. 

His face was very grave, his manner noticeably quiet 
and restrained and very different from its usual jovial 
frankness. 

“This painful duty, doubly painful under the circum- 


38 


MAID OF THE MIST 


stances, as you will understand in a moment, has fallen 
to me in consequence of Dr Tamplin being laid up 
through the fall of his horse yesterday. I am sure you 
will not make it any more painful for me than it is. I 
shall not trouble you long. The matter is unfortu- 
nately clear and simple. Our friend, Mr Pasley Carew, 
died the night before last from the effects of a dose of 
strychnine, administered in a sleeping-draught in mis- 
take for distilled water which was in the bottle along- 
side it on the shelf in my dispensary.” 

His eyes ranged keenly over the startled faces round 
the table at which they had all of them so often sat, — 
under which some of them had not infrequently lain. 

Every face was alight with startled surprise. Not 
one of them showed the remotest sign of questioning his 
statement. 

Indeed, why should they.f^ A man does not as a rule 
confess to so grave a lapse unless it is absolutely un- 
avoidable, unless the truth must out and there is no 
possible loophole of escape. 

Not many men would fling away their life’s prospects 
from simple pity for a woman. For love — yes, without 
a doubt, and count the cost small. But from simple 
pity, in remembrance of the time when the greater love 
had been possible.? . . . 

But no such idea found place in any of their minds. 
His eyes searched theirs for smallest flicker of doubt, 
but found none. Whatever the women at home might 
have suggested as extreme possibilities, these men ac- 
cepted his word without a moment’s hesitation. Elinor 
was perfectly safe. 

“He was in great pain and could only get rest and 
relief by means of opiates. How the mistake occurred 
I cannot explain, except that the bottles of distilled wa- 
ter and of strychnine stand alongside one another on 
my shelf, and that I had come in very tired that night 
and the sleeping-draught was prepared hurriedly. I 


MAID OF THE MIST 


39 


deplore the results more than any of you possibly can, 
and of course I must accept the consequences. I have 
not judged it necessary to make any post-mortem ex- 
amination. I was called by young Job early yesterday 
morning, and when I got here Carew was dead and the 
symptoms were those of poisoning by strychnine. I 
was amazed and horrified, but when I hurried back 
home I saw at once how the mistake might have been 
made, and — and — well, there the matter is and you 
must bring in such verdict as you deem right. You can 
see the body if you wish. You can examine the serv- 
ants. Mrs Carew, I am sorry to say, is quite broken 
down with the shock. She has been, I am told, practi- 
cally unconscious for nearly twenty-four hours and has 
only just come to herself. But if you would like to 
see her ” 

“No, no.” “No need whatever,” said the jurymen 
deprecatingly. 

Dr Wulfrey sat down and dropped his head into his 
hands, then got up again heavily and said, “You will 
discuss this matter better without me. I will leave 
you ” 

“Couldn’t you possibly say he died as result of the 
accident, Wulf asked one — Jim Barclay of Breme. 

They all liked the Doctor. With some he had been 
on terms of very close friendship. Some of them had 
known him all his life and his father before him. 

“Ay, couldn’t you.^” chorussed some of the others. 

“If I could I should have done so,” he said quietly. 
“But it wasn’t so and I couldn’t say it was.” 

“Say it now, Wulf,” urged his friend. “And I swear 
none of us will let it out. Isn’t that so, gentlemen.?” 

“Ay, ay!” — but somewhat dubiously from the older 
members, who saw that after this revelation of the ac- 
tual facts to themselves their relations with the Doctor 
could never be quite the same again, however they 
might succeed in hoodwinking the world outside. 


40 


MAID OF THE MIST 


They knew him, they liked him, but — well, at the 
back of their minds was the thought that if Dr Wulf 
could make a mistake in one case, there was no know- 
ing but what he might in another, — that he might at 
any time come in tired and pick up the wrong bottle, 
— that, whatever risks one might accept on one’s own 
account for old friendship’s sake, one’s wife and daugh- 
ters should hardly be put into such a position all un- 
known to themselves. And more than one of them won- 
dered what he would do if he should happen to be taken 
ill that nights — send for Dr Wulf or the new man down 
in the village.'^ 

Dale diagnosed their symptoms with the sensitiveness 
born of the equivocal nature of the new relationship in 
which his confession placed him towards them. 

“It is like your good-heartedness to suggest it, Bar- 
clay,” he said to his impetuous friend, “but it cannot be. 
I can only do what seems to me right,” and he left them 
to talk over their verdict. 

“Gad ! but I’m mighty sorry this has happened,” said 
one old squire who had known Wulf from the year one. 
“Many’s the time I’ve Sat at this table ” 

“And under it,” interjected one. 

“Ay, and under it, and I never expected to sit round 
it on Pasley Carew. I’d give a year’s rents to have him 
back, even if he was all in pieces and raging like the 
Devil.” 

“Same here. Whatever we decide it’ll get out, and 
it’s bound to tell against Dr Wulf.” 

“He’s bound to suffer, — can’t help it, — it’s human 
nature. Suppose you took ill tonight now, Barclay. 
What would you do ?” 

“What would I do? I’d send for Wulf Dale of 
course, and I’d have same faith in him as I’ve always 
had.” 

“Of course, of course,”— but even those who said it 
had more the air of wishing to placate Barclay, who 


MAID OF THE MIST 


41 


had a temper, rather than of any deep conviction as to 
their own course should the unfortunate necessity arise. 

“Well,” said Barclay, with the manner of a volcano 
on the point of eruption. “All I can say is that if any 
man I know goes ill and does not send for Wulf Dale, 
he’ll have me to reckon with if the other man doesn’t 
kill him.” 

“Hear, hear !” from various points about the table. 

“Well, we’ve got to decide something and make an 
end of the matter,” said one. “Barclay, you write out 
what you think and I’ve no doubt we’ll all agree to it.” 

“I’m going to write nothing,” said Barclay, whose 
strong brown hand was more accustomed to the hunt- 
ing-crop than the pen. “I say ‘Accidental Death,’ and 
keep your mouths shut.” 

They all said ‘Accidental Death’ and promised to 
keep their mouths shut; and Wulfrey, when he was 
called in, thanked them soberly for their good inten- 
tions, but added to their verdict, — “as the result of 
strychnine poison administered in mistake for distilled 
water in a sleeping-draught prepared by Dr Wulfrey 
Dale.” 


X 

Jim Barclay, who was a bachelor, kept his bed next 
morning with an alleged bad cold, — a thing he had 
never been troubled with in all his born days, and osten- 
tatiously sent his man galloping for Dr Wulfrey as 
though his master’s life depended on it. 

Wulfrey smiled at the message, understanding the 
staunch friendliness which lay behind it, and went. 

“Well, what’s wrong with you.^” he enquired of the 
burly patient, when he was shown up to his bedroom. 

“Just you, my boy. Haven’t slept a wink all night 

for thinking of the whole mess. Wulf, my lad, I’m^ 

afraid you’ll have a deuce an’ all of a time of it. 


42 


MAID OF THE MIST 


Thought I’d show ’em there was one man thought none 

the worse of you. ! -! ! Can’t any man 

make a little mistake like that.^ Trouble is, most of 
those other fools have got a pack of yelping women- 
folk about ’em, and they’re all on the quee-vee and as 

keen on the scent as any old ,” and he launched into 

comparisons drawn from the kennels into which we need 
not enter. ‘‘They all promised not to blab, and they’ll 
none of ’em tell any but their wives under promise of 
secrecy, and it’ll be all over the country-side in a week.” 

“I know it, old man. I’ve just got to stand it,” said 
Dale soberly. 

“What’s in your mind then.?^” 

“I’ll just wait quietly and see what comes. I can’t 
expect things to be as they were before.” 

“And if things go badly .? it all !” 

“Then I’m thinking I’ll go too.” 

“Where.?” 

“Oh, right away. America maybe, or Canada. It’s 
a big country they say and just beginning to open up. 
I shan’t starve anyway, wherever I go.” 

“But, — to leave us all and all this.? 

it all, man ! The place won’t be like itself without you. 
Pasley Carew!” 

“It wasn’t his fault, you know ” 

“It was his fault putting Blackbird at that 

Old Road after the run we’d had, wasn’t it.? I 

told him he was two stone too heavy for her. But he 
always was a fool.” 

“He was to blame there undoubtedly. But the rest I 
take to myself. If folks go to the other man I can’t 
blame them. I shall go nowhere unless I’m sent for.” 

“You’ll have a long holiday,” growled Barclay. 

“Well, I can do with one.” 

“I’ve half a mind to have a smash-up just to keep 
your hand in.” 

“If you do I’ll — I’ll turn the other man on to you.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


43 


‘Hf he puts his nose in here he’ll go out faster than 
he came, I wager you.” 

It was comforting to have so whole-hearted a sup- 
porter; but one patient, and a sham one at that, does 
not make a practice, and Dale very soon felt the effects 
of the course he had chosen. 

He adhered resolutely to the decision he had come to 
to visit none of his patients unless he were sent for. It 
would be neither fair to them nor agreeable to himself. 
It might do more harm than good. 

As to Mrs Carew, — he had visited her immediately 
after the inquest, and told her briefly that all was right 
and she need have no further fears. There was nothing 
wrong with her which a few days’ rest and the relief of 
her mind would not set right. All the same he rather 
feared she might send for him, and he debated in his 
own mind whether, if she did so, he should go or send 
her messenger on to Dr Newman. It appeared to him 
hardly seemly that the man who had accepted the re- 
sponsibility for the death of the husband should con- 
tinue his attendance on his widow. 

She did not of course as yet know the facts of the 
case as outsiders did. He was somewhat doubtful of 
the effect upon her when she came to a clear under- 
standing of the matter. On the whole, he decided it 
would be better if possible not to see her again. What 
he had done for her had been done out of pity, but it 
was not the pity that sometimes leads to warmer feel- 
ing. All that had died a natural death when she mar- 
ried Carew. 

He attended the funeral with the rest. It would 
only have made comment if he had not. And Jim Bar- 
clay and most of the others were at pains to manifest 
their continued friendliness and confidence. 

Whether the full facts had got out he could not tell, 
but, rightly or wrongly, imagined so, and for the sec- 


44 MAID OF THE MIST 

ond time in his life he found himself ill at ease among his 
neighbours. 

The day after the funeral, young Job and a bunch 
of lively dogs came down again with an urgent mes- 
sage from Mrs Carew requesting him to call. 

“Is your mistress worse, Job.f^” he said. 

“She be main bad. Doctor, ’cording to that gal Mol- 
lie, but what ’tis I dunnot know. Mebbe she’s just down 
wi’ it all. Have ye heard only talk yet as t’ who’s 
going to tek on th’ pack.?” 

“Mr Barclay will, I believe. He’s a good man for it.” 

“Ay, he may do. Bit heavy, mebbe, an’ he’s got a 
temper ’bout as bad as Pasley’s.” 

“Bit hot perhaps at times, but he’s an excellent fel- 
low at bottom.” 

“All that, and his cussin’ ain’t to compare wi’ Pas- 
ley’s, which is a good thing. I c’n stand a reasonable 
amount o’ cussin’ myself and no offence taken, but Pas- 
ley did go past th’ mark at times. Th’ very bosses 
kicked when he let out. An’ Jim Barclay he is good to 
his bosses, an’ he only cusses when he must or bust. 
Ay, he’ll do, seein’ you won’t tek it on yourself. Doc- 
tor.” 

“It’s not for me. Job. A doctor’s time is not entirely 
his own, you know.” 

“Ah!” said Job, and picked a twig from the hedge, 
and stuck it in his mouth, and trudged on in solemn 
silence. 

“We wus rather hopin’, feyther an’ me,” he grunted 
after a time, “you’d mebbe have more time now fur th’ 
pack an’ would tek it on.” 

“Why that. Job.?” 

“Well, y’ see, it’ll mek a difference this. It’s bound 
to mek a difference. Folks is such silly fools ’bout such 
things ” 

“What things.?” 

“Why, that there strychnine. ’S if anyone couldn’t 


MAID OF THE MIST 


45 


mek a li’l mistake like that. Might have sense to know 
ye’d never let it happen again. Even th’ leeghtnin’, they 
say, never strikes twice i’ same place. Though sure 
’nufF it did hit th’ old mill one side one day and t’other 
side next day. But even then ’twere opposite sides. 
But folks is fools.” 

“So you know all about it.” 

“Ay, sure ! ’Twere that gal Mollie told me, an’ it 
were Mrs Thelstane’s gal Bet told her. None o’ us 
think a bit the worse o’ you. Doctor, you b'lieve me. 
But some folks is fools — most folks, if it comes to that. 
. . . An’ as to Pasley — well, he were a terror now’n 
again. Th’ Hall’s like Heaven wi’out him.” 

They went on again in silence for a time. But there 
was that in young Job’s mind which had to come out. 

“If ’twere me. Doctor, askin’ your pardon in advance 
for bein’ so bold, what I’d do would be this. I’d just sit 
quiet till they done yelpin’ and yappin’ ’bout it all, then 
I’d marry th’ missus, — we all knows you was sweet on 
her once, — and settle down comfortable at th’ Hall and 
tek over th’ pack an’ mek us all happy.” 

“That’s out of the question. Job.” 

“Is it now.f^ . . . Well, I’m sorry. Wus hopin’ 
mebbe a word of advice from a man what’s old enough 
to be your feyther, an’s known you since day you was 
born, might be o’ some use to ye. We’d like you fain 
well for Master, both o’ th’ Hall an’ th’ Hunt.” 

“You’re a good old chap. Job, and so’s your father, 
but you’ll both be doing me a favour if you’ll stop any 
talk of that kind.” 

“No manner o’ use.?^” 

“No use at all.” 

“Well, I’m main sorry. An’ so’s feyther, I can tell 
ye.” 

Mrs Carew was sitting in a large chintz-covered arm- 
chair before the fire in her bedroom, when he was taken 


4)6 


MAID OF THE MIST 


up to her by Mollie, who favoured him with her own 
diagnosis as they mounted the stairs. 

‘‘She’s that bad again. Can’t sleep and off her food. 
Ain’t had hardly anything all day or yes’day. Just sits 
’fore th’ fire and mopes from morn’n till night. ’Taint 
natural for sure, for him ’at’s gone weren’t one to cry 
for, that’s cert’n. ... No, she don’t complain of any 
pain or anything. Just sits and mopes and cries on 
the quiet’s if her heart was broke. Sure she’d more 
cause to cry before he was took than what she has now.” 

When he entered the room he did not at first see her, 
so sunk down was she in the depths of the great ear- 
flapped chair. 

She made no attempt to rise and greet him. When 
he stood beside her and quietly expressed his regret at 
finding her no better, she covered her face with her 
hands and sobbed convulsively. 

She looked little more than a girl, slight and frail 
and forlorn, as she crouched there with hidden face, 
and he was truly sorry for her. It was impossible for 
him to keep the sympathy he felt entirely out of his 
voice. 

“What can I do for you, Mrs Carew.?^” he asked 
quietly, and the forlorn figure shook again but made 
no response. 

“You are doing yourself harm with all this,” he said 
gently again. “And there is really no occasion for it, 
that I can see.” 

Her silent extremity of grief — her utter discomfiture 
was pitiful to look upon. It touched him profoundly, 
for he penetrated the meaning of it. She was over- 
whelmed with the knowledge of the sacrifice he had 
made for her — and with pity for herself. 

All he could do was to wait quietly till the feeling, 
roused afresh by his presence, had spent itself. 

“Oh, I did not know,” she whispered at last, through 
the shielding hands. “I did not know you would do 


MAID OF THE MIST 47 

that. ... You have ruined yourself. ... You should 
have let them hang me.” 

And there and then, on the spur of the moment, he 
leaped up a height which he had not even sighted a 
second before. 

He had, by the sacrifice of his prospects, saved her 
from the legal consequences of her act. That was irrev- 
ocably past and done with, and he must pay the price. 
But she was paying a double due — remorse for what she 
herself had done, bitter sorrow at the ruinous price he 
had paid for her safety. 

He had saved her life. Why not save her the resti^ — 
her peace of mind, all her possibilities of future happi- 
ness. 

In any case it would make no difference to him. For 
her it might mean all the difference between darkness 
and light for the rest of her life. And she looked piti- 
fully helpless and hopeless as she lay there sobbing con- 
vulsively in the big chair. 

He saw the possibility in a flash and gripped it. 

‘‘Hang you? Why on earth should anyone want to 
hang you?” he askedy with all the natural surprise he 
could put into it. 

“You know,” — in a scared whisper. “Because I got 
him the poison ” 

“Come, come now! Let us have no more of that. 
I was hoping a good night’s rest would have ridded you 
of that bad dream.” 

“Dream?” and she looked up at him wildly. “Ah, 
if I could only believe it was a dream!” and she shook 
her head forlornly. 

“Why, of course it was a dream. You were over- 
wrought with it all, and your mind took the bit in its 
teeth and ran away with you. What you’ve got to do 
now is to try to forget all about it.” 

“Forget!” 

“How I came to make such a mistake I cannot im- 


48 


MAID OF THE MIST 


agine, but when I got home I saw at once that there was 
an extra dose gone out of my strychnine bottle instead 
of out of the distilled water, and that explained it at 
once.” 

^^You? ,,, You made the mistake.'^” she looked up 
at him again, eagerly, with warped face and knitted 
brows, and a wavering flutter of hope in her eyes. . . . 
“You are only saying it to comfort me.” 

“I’m trying to show you how foolish it is to allow 
yourself to be ridden by this strange notion you’ve got 
into your head.” 

“Strange notion . . . Did he not beg me to get him 
that stuff he used for the rats? And did I not get it 

for him? And he took it. And then ” she shivered 

at the remembrance of what followed when her husband 
took the draught. 

“All in that horrible dream when your mind was run- 
ning away with you ” 

“And did you not come and tell me they would hang 
me unless I kept my mouth shut? And I lay all that 
dreadful night with the rope round my neck ” 

‘All in your dream. I’m sorry. It must have been 
terribly real to you.” 

“A dream?” and she stared wistfully into the fire, her 
hands clasping and unclasping nervously. “If I could 
believe it!” 

“You must believe what I tell you, and forget all 
about it and recover yourself.” 

“And you?” she said after a pause. 

“I shall be all right. Don’t trouble your head about 
me.” 

“If I did not do it,” she said, after another long si- 
lent gazing into the fire, “then there would be no need 
for you to hate me ” 

“No need whatever, — all part of that stupid dream.” 

“And . . . sometime perhaps . . . you would think 


MAID OF THE MIST 49 

better of me ... as you used to do. Oh, — Wulfrey! 

55 

If it had all happened as he had almost persuaded her 
to believe, he might have fallen into his own pit. 

For, under the stress of her emotions, — the wild hope 
of the possibility of relief from the horror that had been 
weighing her down, — the letting in of this thread of 
sunshine into the blackness of her despair, — the sudden 
joy of the thought that it was not she who needed Wul- 
frey’s forgiveness, but he hers, — ^the shadows and the 
years fell from her, and she was more like the Elinor 
Baynard he had once been in love with than he had seen 
her since the day she married Pasley Carew. 

“We must not think of any such things,” he said 
quickly, but not unkindly. He was very sorry for her, 
but he was no longer in love with her. “At present all 
we’ve got to think about is getting you quite yourself 
again. I will send you up some medicine, — if you won’t 
be afraid to take it ” 

“Oh, Wulfrey! . . .” with all the reproach she could 
put into it, and anxiously, “You will come again soon?” 

“If you get on well perhaps. If you don’t I shall 
turn you over to Dr Newman,” and he left her. 

“She ain’t agoing to die. Doctor?” asked Mollie, as 
she waylaid him. 

“No, Mollie. She’s going to get better.” 

“Ah, I knew it’d do her good if you came to see her,” 
said the astute handmaid with an approving look. 

“Get her to eat, and feed her up. She’s been letting 
herself run down.” 

“Ah, she’ll eat now maybe, if so be ’s you’ve given her 
a bit of an appetite,” said Mollie hopefully; and Dr 
Wulfrey went away home. 


50 


; MAID OF THE MIST 


XI 

But even two patients hardly make a practice, and 
though from the stolid commoner folk calls still came 
for ‘th’ Doctor’s’ services, upon the better classes a 
sudden blessing of unusual health appeared to have 
fallen, or else 

Dr Newman bought a horse about this time, and, 
though he did not as yet cut much of a figure on horse- 
back, it enabled him to get about as he had never had 
occasion to do since he settled in the village, and it 
seemed as though, in his case as in others, practice 
would in time make him passable. 

Wulfrey watched the course of events quietly and 
with a certain equanimity. His mind was quite made 
up to go abroad, but he would not go till he was satis- 
fied that that was the only course left to him. 

Everybody he met was as friendly as ever, the men 
especially, but sickness was a rare thing with them at 
any time, and their women-folk seemed to be getting 
along very well, for the time being without medical as- 
sistance, so far at all events as Dr Wulfrey Dale was 
concerned. 

Mrs Carew was better. Whatever she really believed 
as to the actual facts of her husband’s death, she ap- 
parently accepted Dale’s statement, to the great relief 
of her mind and consequent benefit to her health. She 
sent for the Doctor as often as she reasonably could, 
and sometimes without any better reason than her de- 
sire to see him. Until at last he told her she was per- 
fectly well and he would come no more unless there 
were actual need. 

“But there is actual need, Wulfrey. It does me good 
to see you. If you don’t come I shall fall into a low 
state again.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


51 


“If you do I shall know it is simple perversity and I’ll 
send Dr Newman to you.” 

“Mollie would never let him in.” 

Which was likely enough, for Mollie’s mind was quite 
made up as to the only right and proper course for 
matters to take under all the present circumstances. 

The March winds brought on a mild epidemic of in- 
fluenza. 

Dr Newman and his new horse were ostentatiously 
busy. Wulfrey saw that he had waited long enough, 
and that now it was time to go. No one could accuse 
him of running away. It was his practice that had 
found its legs and walked over to Dr Newman. 

He made his arrangements at once and by no means 
downcastly. The hanging-on had been trying. It was 
new life to be up and doing, with a new world some- 
where in front to be discovered and conquered. 

Fie packed his trunks, gave Mr Truscott, the lawyer, 
instructions to dispose of his house and everything in it 
except certain specified articles and pictures,^ arranged 
with his bankers at Chester to collect and re-invest his 
dividends, drew out a couple of hundred pounds to go 
on with, told them he was going abroad and they might 
not hear from him for some time to come, and went 
round to say good-bye to Jim Barclay and Elinor 
Carew. 

“Where are you going?” asked Barclay, when he 
heard he was off. 

“Wherever the chase may lead,” said Wulfrey, in 
better spirits than he had been for many a day. “I 
shall go first to the States and Canada and have a good > 
look round. If any place lays hold of me I may settle 
down there.” 

“For good and all.^” 

“Possibly. Can’t say till I see what it’s like. I want 
you to take Graylock and Billyboy till I come baqk.' 


52 


MAID OF THE MIST 


You know all about them. There’s no one else I’d care 
to leave ’em with and I don’t care to sell them.” 

“They’ll miss you, same as the rest of us.” 

“For a week or two, maybe. Dr Newman is getting 
into things nicely, but you might give him a lesson or 
two in riding, Jim.” 

“ him, I’d liefer break his back !” was Barclay’s 

terse comment. “You’ll let me know where you get to, 
Wulf, and maybe I’ll take a run over to see you, if you 
really find it in your heart to settle out there. I’ll 
bring the horses with me if you like.” 

“I’ll let you know. Fine sporting country, I believe, 
— bears, wolves, buffaloes, game of sorts.” 

“Well, good-bye and God bless you, ipy boy! Re- 
member there’ll always be one man in the old country 
that wants you. I’d sooner die than have that new man 
poking round me. I’ll send for old Tom Tamplin, 
hanged if I don’t.” 

Wulfrey rode on to the Hall. 

“Going away, Wulf.^ Where to and for how long.?” 
asked Elinor, anxious and troubled., 

“That depends. I’ve not been up to the mark lately 
and a good long change will set me up.” 

“But you will come back.?” 

“I have really no plans made, except to get away for 
a time and see a bit of the outside world.” 

“I was hoping . . . you would stop and . . . some- 
time, perhaps . . .” and the small white hands clasped 
and unclasped nervously, as was her way when her 
mind was upset. 

“The change I am sure will be good for me. And 
you are quite all right again. You are looking better 
than I’ve seen you for a long time past.” 

“I’m all right,” she said drearily, “except that I have 
bad dreams now and again. I cannot be quite sure in 
my own mind ” 

“Now, now!” — shaking a peremptory finger at her 


MAID OF THE MIST 


53 


— “That is all past and done with. Bad dreams are 
forbidden, remember!” 

“I can’t help their coming. They come in spite of 
all my trying at times. And they are always the same. 
I see Pasley lying on the bed, raging and cursing, and 
ordering me to go and get him ” 

“It’s only a dream of a dream. I was hoping you 
had quite got the better of it. You must fight against 
it. Now I must run. Got a lot of things to do yet, and 
I’m off first thing in the morning. Good-bye, Elinor, 
— and all happiness to you 1” 


BOOK II 


NO MAN’S LAND 


XII 

WuLFREY Dal-e, as he strolled about the Liverpool 
docks and basins, felt very much like a schoolboy who 
had run away from home in search of the wide free life 
of the Rover of the Seas. 

He had, however, one vast advantage over the run- 
away, in that he had money in his pocket and could 
pick and choose, and there was no angry master or 
troubled parent on his track to haul him back to bond- 
age. 

He had no slightest regrets in the matter. Under all 
the circumstances of the case, he said to himself, he 
could have done nothing else. Elinor, left to herself, 
would undoubtedly have paid with her life, either on the 
gallows or in a mad-house, and that was unthinkable. 
The inexorable Law would have taken no account of the 
true inwardness of the case. He had saved her because 
he understood, and because the alternatives had been 
too dreadful to think of. 

As to the cost to himself, — the long blue-green heave 
of the sea, out there beyond the point, made little of 
that, changed it indeed from one side of the account to 
the other, and presented it, not as a loss, but as very 
substantial gain. 

Out beyond there lay the world, the vast unknown, 
the larger life; and the windy blue sky streaked with 
long-drawn wisps of feathery white cloud, and the tum- 
bling green waves with their crisp white caps, and the 
54 . 


MAID OF THE MIST 


55 


screaming gulls in their glorious free flight, all tugged 
at his heart and called him to the quest. 

And these cumbered quays, with their heaps of mer- 
chandise, and the jerking ropes and squeaking pulley- 
blocks that piled them higher and higher every moment, 
— the swaying masts up above and busy decks down be- 
low, — the strange foreign smells and flavour of it all, — 
the rough tarry-breeks hanging about and spitting 
jovially in the intervals of uncouth talk, — all these were 
but a foretaste of the great change, and he savoured 
them all with vastest enjoyment. 

He inspected, from a distance, the great clippers that 
did the voyage to New York in twenty to twenty-flve 
days, stately and disciplined, in the very look of them, 
as ships of the line almost. 

There were ships loading and unloading for and 
from nearly every port in the world. It was like being 
at the centre of a mighty spider’s web whose arms and 
filaments reached out to the extremest ends of the 
earth. He had never felt so free in his life before. 

He was in no pressing hurry to settle on either his 
port or his ship, but in any case it would not be on one 
of those great packet-boats he would go. His fancy 
ran rather to something smaller, something more inti- 
mate in itself and less likely to be crowded with pas- 
sengers whose acquaintance he had no desire to make. 

He wandered further among the smaller craft, with a 
relish in the search that was essentially a part of the 
new life. He developed quite a discriminating taste in 
ships, though it was only by chatting with the old salts 
who lounged about the quay-walls that he learned to 
distinguish a ship from a barque and a brig from a 
schooner. His preferences were based purely on ap- 
pearances. The sea-faring qualities of the various 
craft were beyond him. 

But here and there, one and another would attract 
him by reason of its looks, and he would return again 


56 


: MAID OF THE MIST 


and again to compare them with still later discoveries, 
saying to himself, “Yes, that would do first-rate now, if 
she should happen to be going my way. We’ll see pres- 
ently.” 

He came, in time, upon a brig loading in one of these 
outer basins, and even to his untutored eye she was a 
picture, — so graceful her lines, so tapering her masts, 
so trim and taut the whole look of her. 

“Where does she go to.?” he asked of an old sailor- 
man, who was sitting on a cask, chewing his quid like an 
old cow and spitting meditatively at intervals. 

“Bawst’n, ’Merica, ’s where she’s bound this v’y’ge. 
Mister, an’ ef she did it in twenty days I shouldn’t be 
a bit s’prised, not a bit, I shouldn’.” 

“Good-looking boat! What does she carry.?” 

“Miskellaneous cargo. Bit o’ everything, as you 
might say.” 

“And when does she sail.?” 

“Fust tide, I reck’n, ef so be’s her crew a’n’t been 
ganged. Finished loading not ha’f an hour ago she 
did.” 

“Does she take any passengers.?” 

“Couldn’ say. Passenger boats is mostly down yon- 
der.” 

“I know, but I like the look of this one better than 
the big ones.” 

“Well, you c’n ask aboard.” 

“Yes How can I get on board.?” 

“Why, down that there ladder,” and Wulfrey, fol- 
lowing the direction of a ponderous roll of the old fel- 
low’s head and a squirt of tobacco- juice, came upon 
some iron rungs let into a straight up-and-down groove 
in the face of the quay-wall. By going down on his 
hands and knees, and making careful play with his feet, 
he managed at last to get on to this apology for a lad- 
der and succeeded in climbing down it, over the side of 
the ship on to its deck. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


57 


The deck, dirty as it was with the work of loading, 
felt springy to his unaccustomed feet. It was the first 
ship’s deck he had ever trodden. The very feel of it 
was exhilarating. It was like setting foot on the bridge 
that led to the new life. 

As he looked about him, — at the neatly-coiled ropes, 
the rope-handled buckets, the blue water-casks lashed to 
the deck below one of the masts, the masts themselves, 
massive below but tapering up into the sky like fishing- 
rods, the mazy network of rigging, four little brass car- 
ronades and the ship’s bell, all polished to the nines and 
shining like gold, — the worries and troubles of the last 
few months fell from him like a ragged garment. Elinor 
Carew, and Croome, and Jim Barclay, and even Gray- 
lock and Billyboy, the parting with whom had been as 
sore a wrench as any, all seemed very far away, things 
of the past, shadowy in presence of these stimulating 
realities of the new life. 

He walked aft along the deck towards a door under 
the raised poop, and at the sound of his coming a man 
came out of the door and said, “Hello !” and stood and 
stared at him out of a pair of very deep-set, sombre 
black eyes. 

He was a tall, well-built fellow of about Wulfrey’s 
own age, black-haired, black-bearded and moustached, 
and of a somewhat saturnine countenance. His face 
and neck were the colour of dark mahogany with much 
sun and weather. He wore small gold rings in his ears, 
and Wulfrey set him down for a foreigner, — a Span- 
iard, he thought, or perhaps an Italian. 

“I was told you were sailing tomorrow for Boston,” 
said Wulfrey. “I came to ask if you take passengers.” 

The man’s black brows lifted a trifle and he took 
stock of Wulfrey while he considered the question. 
Then he said, “Ay.? well, we do and we don’t,” and Wul- 
frey rearranged his ideas as to his nationality and de- 


58 


MAID OF THE MIST 


cided that he was either Scotch or North of Ireland, 
though he did not look either one or the other. 

“That perhaps means that you might.” 

“Et’s for the auld man to say ” 

“The Captain?” 

“Ay, Cap’n Bain.” 

“Where could I see him?” 

“He’s up in the toon.” 

“If you’ll tell me where to find him I’ll go after him.” 

The other seemed to turn this over in his mind, and 
then said, “Ye’d best see him here. He’ll mebbe no be 
long.” 

“Then I’ll wait. What time do you expect to clear 
out?” 

“We’ll know when the old man comes.” 

“Perhaps you would let me see the rooms, while I’m 
waiting.” 

The dark man turned slowly and went down three 
steps into the small main cabin. His leisurely manner 
suggested no more than a willingness not to be disoblig- 
ing. 

It was a fair-sized room, with a grated skylight over- 
head, portholes at the sides, seats and lockers below 
them, and a table with wooden forms to sit on. At the 
far end were two more doors. 

“Cap’n’s bunk and mine,” said his guide, with a roll 
of the head towards the left-hand door, and opened the 
other for Wulfrey to look in at the narrow passage off 
which opened two small sleeping-rooms. 

“You are then ?” asked Wulfrey. 

“Mate.” 

“You’re Scotch, aren’t you? I took you at first 
sight for a foreigner.” 

“I’m frae the Islands. . . . Some folks hold there’s 
mixed blood in some of us since the times when the 
Spaniards were wrecked there. Mebbe! I d’n know.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


59 


“And Captain Bain? He’s Scotch too, I judge, by 
his name.” 

“Ay, he’s Scotch — Glesca.” 

“If he’ll take me as passenger I’ll be glad. This 
would suit me uncommonly well.” 

“Ay, well. He’ll say when he comes,” and whenever 
his black eyes rested on Wulfrey they seemed to be 
questioning what it could be that made him wish to 
travel on a trading-brig rather than on a passenger- 
liner. 

However, he asked no questions but pulled out a 
black clay pipe, and Wulfrey pulled out his own and 
anticipated the other’s search for tobacco by handing 
him his pouch. 

They had sat silently smoking for but a few min- 
utes when a heavy foot was heard on the deck outside, 
and there came a gruff call for “Macro !” 

“Ay, ay, sir !” and the doorway darkened with the 
short burly figure of a man whose words preceded him, 

“Tom Crimp’ll have ’em all here by ten o’clock an’ 
we’ll Wha the deevil’s this?” 

“Wants to go passenger to Boston,” explained the 
mate, and left Wulfrey to his own negotiations. 

“If you’re open to take a passenger. Captain Bain. 
I’ve fallen in love with the looks of your ship.” 

“What for d’ye no want to go in a passenger-ship? 
We’re no a passenger-ship,” and the Captain eyed him 
suspiciously. 

“Just that I dislike travelling with a crowd. I’ve 
been looking round for some days and your ship pleases 
me better than any I’ve seen.” 

“Where are you from, and what’s your name and 
rating.f^” 

“I’m from Cheshire. Name, Wulfrey Dale. Rating, 
Doctor.” 

“An’ what for are ye wanting to go to Boston?” 


60 


MAID OF THE MIST 


‘‘I’m going out to look round. I may settle out 
there if I find any place I like.” 

“Are ye in trouble.? Poisoned ony one.? Resurrec- 
tionist, mebbe.?” 

“Neither one nor the other. I’ve no work here. I’m 
going to look for some over there.” 

“Can ye pay.?” 

“Of course. I’m not asking you to take me out of 
charity.” 

“That’s a guid thing.” 

“How much shall we say? And when do you sail.?” 

“Et’ll be twenty guineas, ped in advance, an’ ef ye 
want ony victuals beyant what the ship provides, which 
is or’nary ship’s fare same as me and the mate eats, ye’ll 
provide ’em yourself.” 

“Understood! And you sail ” 

“To-night’s flood, ef the men get aboard all safe. 
They’re promised me for ten o’clock.” 

“I’ll pay you now and go up for my things.” 

“An’ ’^haur may they be.?” 

“At Cotton’s, in Castle Street.” 

“Aweel! Juist keep a quiet tongue in your heid. 
Doctor, as to the ship ye’re sailing on. The ‘Grassadoo’ 
doesna tak passengers, ye ken, an’ I dinna want it 
talked aboot.” 

“I understand. I’ve only got a box and a bag, but 
I’ll have to get a man to carry them.” 

“Ay — weel 1” and after a moment’s consideration, 
“You wait at Cotton’s an’ we’ll send Jock Steele, the 
carpenter, up for them at eight o’clock. Ye can coach 
or truck ’em as far as he says and carry ’em between 
you the rest.” 

So Wulfrey paid down his twenty guineas, and Cap- 
tain Bain stowed them away in his trouser pocket, and 
buttoned it up carefully, with a dry, “Donal’ Bain’s 
word’s his only recip^^. You be here before ten o’clock 
and the ‘Grassadoo’ ’ll be waiting for you.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


61 


“That’s all right, Captain,” said Wulfrey. “And 
I’m much obliged to you for stretching a point and 
taking me.” 

“It’s me that’s doing it, ye understand, not the own- 
ers. That’s why.” 


XIII 

The ‘Grace-a-Dieu’ justified Wulfrey ’s inexperienced 
choice. She was an excellent sea-boat, fast, and as dry 
as could be expected, seeing that she was. chock full to 
the hatches, as Jock Steele informed him, while they 
carried down his baggage. 

But after his first four hours on board his personal 
interest in her character and performance lapsed for 
three full days. He had stood leaning over the side 
watching the lights of Liverpool as they dropped away 
astern, and then those of the Cheshire and North Welsh 
coasts, and felt that now indeed he had cut loose from 
the past and was in for a great adventure. 

It gave him a curious, mixed feling of depression and 
elation. He felt at once homeless and endowed with the 
freedom of the universe. He had burned his boats, he 
said confidently to himself, and was going forth to begin 
a new life, to conquer a new world. And he set his 
teeth and hung on to the heaving bulwark with grim de- 
termination. 

But the sense of elation and width of outlook dwin- 
dled with the sinking lights. The feeling of homeless- 
ness and helplessness grew steadily upon him. He had 
taken the precaution of stowing away a good meal be- 
fore he set foot on board, and he lived on it for three 
days. 

He had never been bodily sick in his life before, but 
sick as he now was he was not too far gone to note the 
wretched peculiarity of his sensations, and to muse 
upon them and the ridiculousness of the provision he 


62 


MAID OF THE MIST 


had made, at the Captain’s suggestion, to supplement 
the usual cabin fare. 

He could not imagine himself ever eating again, as 
he lay there in his heaving bunk, with nothing to dis- 
tract his mind from the unhappy vacuums above and 
below but the heavy tread of feet overhead at times, 
and the ceaseless rush and thrash of the waves a few 
inches from his ear, and the grinning face of the cabin- 
boy who came in at intervals to ask if he would like 
anything yet. 

But by degrees his head ceased to swim if he lifted it 
an inch off the pillow. By further degrees he found 
himself crouching up and clinging like a cat while he 
gazed unsteadily out of the tiny round porthole at the 
tumbling green and white water outside. Still further 
determination got him somehow into his clothes, and he 
dared to feel hungry and empty without nausea. Then 
he crawled out to the deck, feeling like a soiled rag. But 
the brisk south-west wind cleaned and braced him, and 
presently he nibbled a biscuit and found himself as hun- 
gry as a starving dog. 

After that he very soon found his sea-legs, and by the 
fourth day he was a new man, eating ravenously to 
make up for lost time, and keenly interested in all about 
him. 

So far they had had favourable weather and made 
good way. But Captain Bain was a fervent believer in 
the inevitability of equinoctials, and prophesied gales 
ahead, and the worse for being overdue. 

Wulfrey learned, from one and another, chatting at 
meals with the Captain or Sheumaish Macro, one or 
other of whom was generally on deck, or with Jock 
Steele the carpenter, who also acted as boatswain, that 
the ‘Grace-a-Dieu’ was French-built which, according to 
Steele, accounted for the fineness of her lines. 

“We build stouter but we cannot touch them for cut. 
She’s as pretty a little ship as ever I set eyes on and 


MAID OF THE MIST 


63 


floats like a gull,” was the character Steele gave her. 
And he should know, as he’d made four voyages in her 
since their owners in Glasgow bought her out of the 
Prize Court, and she’d never given them any undue 
trouble even in the very worst of weather. 

The crew, again according to Steele, were a very 
mixed lot, a few good seamen, the rest just lubbers out 
of the crimp house. 

With Captain Bain and Sheumaish Macro, the mate, 
he got on well enough, but found both by nature very 
self-contained and manifesting no inclination for more 
than the necessary civilities of the situation. 

“And why should they.?^” he said to himself. “Pm 
an outsider and they know nothing more about me than 
I’ve told them myself. Another fifteen or twenty days 
and we part and are not likely ever to meet again.” 

He made one discovery about them, however, which 
disquieted him somewhat. They were both heavy drink- 
ers, but they usually so arranged matters, by taking 
their full bouts at different times, as not to bring the 
ship into serious peril. 

Wulfrey’s eyes were opened to it by the fact of his 
not being able to sleep one night. After tossing and 
tumbling in his bunk for a couple of hours, and finding 
sleep as far off as ever, he dressed again sufficiently to 
go on deck for a blow. As he passed through the cabin 
he found Captain Bain there with his head sunk on his 
arms on the table, and, fearing he might be ill, he went 
up to him. But he needed no medical skill to tell him 
what was the matter. The old man was as drunk as a 
lord and breathing like an apoplectic hog. So he eased 
his neck gear and left him to sleep it off. 

Macro was on deck in charge of the ship. Wulfrey 
simply told him he had been unable to sleep, but made 
no mention of the Captain’s condition. And the mate 
said, 


64 


MAID OF THE MIST 


“Ay, we’re just getting into thick of Gulf Stream and 
it tells on one.” 

Another night he found Steele in charge, and on the 
growl at the length of his watch, and gathered from 
him that both Captain and mate had on this occasion 
been indulging in a bit drink and were snoring in their 
bunks. 

He could only hope that Captain Bain’s prognosti- 
cated equinoctials, which were now considerably over- 
due, would not come upon t{iem when both their chiefs 
were incapacitated. And his only consolation was the 
thought that this was not an exceptional occurrence but 
probably their usual habit when well afloat, and that so 
far no disaster had befallen them. 

So, day after day, they sped along west-south-west, 
making good way and sighting none but an occasioal 
distant sail. Then they ran into mists and clammy 
weather, and sometimes had a wind and drove along 
with the swirling fog or across it, and sometimes lay 
rocking idly and making no way at all. 

Wulfrey gathered, from occasional words they let 
fall between themselves, and from their answers to his 
own questions, that this was all usual and to be ex- 
pected. They were getting towards Newfoundland 
where the Northern currents met the Southern, hence 
the fog, and it was too early for icebergs, so there was 
no danger in pressing on whenever the wind permitted. 

Their seventeenth day out was the dullest they had 
had, heavy and windless, with a shrouded sky and a 
close gray horizon and, to Wulfrey’s thinking, a sense 
of something impending. It was as though Nature had 
gone into the sulks and was brooding gloomily over 
some grievance. 

Captain Bain stripped the ship of her canvas, and 
sent down the topmasts and yards, and made all snug 
for anything that might turn up. All day and all night 


MAID OF THE MIST 


65 


they lay wallowing in vast discomfort, and Wulfrey lost 
all relish for his food again. 

“What do you make of it, Bo’s’un?” he asked, as he 
clawed his way up to Steele on the after deck, where he 
was temporarily in charge again. 

“Someth’n’s coinin’, sir,” said Steele portentously, 
“but what it is beats-'me, unless it’s one o’ them e-quy- 
noctials the skipper’s bin looking for.” 

In the night the fog closed down on them as thick as 
cotton wool; and, without a breath of wind, the long 
seas came rolling in upon them out of the thick white 
bank on one side and out into the thick white bank on 
the other, till their scuppers dipped deep and worked 
backwards, shooting up long hissing white jets over 
the deck, and making everything wet and uncomforta- 
ble. Every single joint and timber in the ship seemed 
to creak and groan as if in pain, and Wulfrey, as he 
listened in the dark to the strident jerkings and grind- 
ings and general complainings of the gear, and pictured 
the wild sweeps and swoops of the masts away up in 
the fog there, wondered how long it could all stand the 
strain, and how soon it would come clattering down on 
top of them. Once, when a bigger roll than usual flung 
him against the mainmast and he clung to it for a mo- 
ment’s safety, the rending groans that came up through 
it from the depths below sent a creepy chill down his 
spine. It sounded so terribly as though the very heart 
of his ship were coming up by the roots. 

Sleep was out of the question. His cabin was un- 
bearable. Its dolorous creakings seemed to threaten 
collapse and burial at any moment. If they had to go 
down he would sooner be drowned in the open than 
like a rat in its hole. And so he had crawled up on 
deck to see what was towards. 

The only comfort he found — and that of a very 
mixed character — was in the sight of Captain Bain and 
the mate, sitting one on each side of the cabin table 


66 


MAID OF THE MIST 


with their legs curled knowingly round its stout wooden 
supports, which were bolted to the floor, and which they 
used alternately as fender and anchor to the rolling of 
the ship. 

They had made all possible provision against contin- 
gencies. They could do no more, and it was no good 
worrying, so now they sat smoking philosophically and 
drinking now and again from a bottle of rum which 
hung by the neck between them from a string attached 
to the beam above their heads. 

Wulfrey stood the discomforts of the deck till he 
was chilled to the marrow, then he tumbled into the 
cabin, and annexed a third leg of the table and sat with 
the philosophers and waited events. 

“It’s hard on the ship. Captain,” he said, by way of 
being companionable. But the Captain only grunted 
and deftly tipped some rum into his tin pannikin as the 
bottle swung towards him on its way towards the roof. 
And the mate looked at him wearily as much as to say, 
“Man! don’t bother us with your babytalk,” and it 
seemed to him that they had both got a fairly full cargo 
aboard. 

However, he decided it was not for him to judge or 
condemn. They knew their own business feller than 
he did. There was no wind, no way on the ship, and 
all they could do was to lie and wallow and wait for 
better times. And the fact that they took it so calmly 
reassured him somewhat. 

The cabin was so full of fog and tobacco-smoke that 
the light from the swinging oil-lamp could barely pene- 
trate beyond the table. It made a dull ghastly smudge 
of yellow light through which the bottle swung to and 
for like an uncouth pendulum, and he sat and watched 
it. Now it was up above his head between him and the 
mate; now it was sweeping gracefully over the table; 
now it was up above the Captain, who reached out and 
tipped some more rum into his pannikin. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


67 


He watched it till it began to exert a mesmeric influ- 
ence on him and his head began to feel light and 
swimmy. He knew something about Mesmer and his 
experiments from his reading at home. He experi- 
enced a detached interest in his own condition and won- 
dered vaguely if the bottle would succeed in putting him 
to sleep. He tried to keep his eyes on it, but they kept 
wandering off to the Captain, on whom it had already 
done its business, though in a different way. 

He was dead tired. It was, he reckoned, quite six- 
and-thirty hours since he had had any sleep. What 
time of night or morning it was he had no idea. This 
awful rolling and groaning and creaking seemed to have 
been going on for an incalculable time. 

What with the heavy unwholesomeness of the atmos- 
phere, and the monotonous swing of the bottle, and the 
lethargic impassivity of his companions, he fell at last 
into a condition of dull stupidity, which might have 
ended in sleep but for the necessity of alternately hang- 
ing on to and fending off the table, as the roll of the 
ship flung him away from it or at it. And how long 
this went on he never knew. 

He was jerked back to life by a sudden clatter of 
feet overhead and a shout. Then he was flung bodily 
on to the table, and found himself lying over it and 
looking down at Captain Bain, who had tumbled back- 
wards in a heap into a corner. The rum-bottle banged 
against the roof and rained its fragments down on him. 
The lamp leaned up at a preposterous angle and 
stopped there. 

“We’re done,” thought Wulfrey dazedly, and became 
aware of fearsome sounds outside, — a wild howling 
shriek as of all the fiends out of the pit, — thunderous 
blows as of mighty hammers under which the little ship 
reeled and staggered, — then grisly crackings and rend- 
ings and crashes on deck, mingled with the feeble shouts 
of men. 


68 


MAID OF THE MIST 


Then, shuddering and trembling, the ship slowly 
righted herself and Wulfrey breathed again. Outside, 
the howling shriek was as loud as ever, the banging and 
buffeting worse than before. 

Macro unhooked his long legs from the table and 
made for the door. The Captain gathered himself up 
dazedly and rolled after him, and Wulfrey followed as 
best he could. 

But he could see very little. The fog was gone. The 
fierce rush of the gale drove the breath back into his 
throat and came near to choking him. Huge green seas 
topped with snarhng white came leaping up over the 
side of the ship near him. A man with an axe was 
chopping furiously at the shrouds of the fallen main- 
mast amid a wild tangle of ropes and spars. As they 
parted, the ship swung free and went labouring off be- 
fore the gale under somewhat easier conditions, and 
Wulfrey hung tight in the cabin doorway and breathed 
still more hopefully. He had thought the end was 
come, but they were still afloat, though sadly shorn and 
battered. What their chances of ultimate safety might 
be was beyond him, but while there was life there was 
hope. 

XIV 

For three days life to Wulfrey was a grim experience 
made up of damp discomfort, lack of food and rest, and 
growing hopelessness. 

Both their masts had gone like carrots, leaving only 
their ragged stumps sticking up out of the deck. “An’ 
if they hadn’t we’d bin gone ourselves,” growled the 
carpenter to him one day. Where they fell the sides of 
the ship were smashed and torn, and the hungry waves 
came yapping up through the gaps, most horribly close 
and threatening. 

Three men had been washed overboard in that first 


X 


MAID OF THE MIST 69 

fierce onrush. The rest crouched miserably in the fore- 
castle, and no man on board could remember what it 
felt like to be dry and warm and full. 

Meals there were none. When any man’s hunger 
forced him to eat, he wolfed sodden biscuit and a chunk 
of raw pork, and washed it down with rum. 

So ghastly did the discomfort become, as the 
wretched days succeeded the still more misera^ble nights, 
that at last Wulfrey, for one, was prepared to welcome 
even the end as a change for the better. 

Observations were out of the question. In these four 
days they never once saw sun or moon or star, nothing 
but a close black sky, gray with flying spume. The 
great seas came roaring out of it behind them and 
rushed roaring into it in front of them, and where they 
were getting to, beyond the fact that they were driving 
continuously more or less west-by-north, no man knew. 

Captain Bain and the mate and the carpenter had 
done all that could be done since the catastrophe, b.ut 
that was very little. An attempt was made to rig a 
jury mast on the stump of the foremast, but the gale 
ripped it away with a jeering howl and would have none 
of it. With some planking torn from the inside of the 
ship they barricaded the seas out of the forecastle as 
well as they could. It was the carpenter’s idea to fix 
these planks upright, so that their ends stood up some- 
what above the top of the forecastle, and so great was 
the grip of the gale that that slight projection sufficed 
to keep their head straight before it and afforded them 
slight steerage way. 

So they staggered along, dismantled and discomfited, 
and waited for the gale to blow itself out or them to 
perdition, and were worn so low at last that they did 
not much care which, so only an end to their misery. 

And the end came as unexpectedly as the beginning. 
From sheer weariness they slept at times, in chill dis- 
comfort and dankest wretchedness, just where they sat 


70 


MAID OF THE MIST 


or lay. And Wulfrey was lying so, in a stupor oT 
misery, caring neither for life nor death, when the final 
catastrophe came. 

Without any warning the ship struck something with 
a horrible shock that flung everything inside it ajee. 
Then she heeled over on her starboard side, baring her 
breast to the enemy. 

The great green waves leaped at her like wolves on a 
foundered deer. They had been chasing her for three 
days past and now they had got her. She was down 
and they proceeded to worry her to pieces. No ship 
ever built could stand against their fury. The ‘Grace- 
a-Dieu’ melted into fragments as though she had been 
built of cardboard. 

Wulfrey jerked violently out of the corner where he 
had been lying, rolled down towards the door of the 
cabin as the ship heeled over. As he clawed himself up 
to look out, a green mountain of water caught him up 
and carried him high over the port bulwarks which 
towered like a house above him, and swept him along 
on its broken crest. 

He could swim, but no swimmer could hope to save 
himself by swimming in such a sea, and he was weak and 
worn with the miseries of the last three days. 

He had no hope of deliverance, but yet struck out 
mechanically to keep his head above water, and his 
thrashing arm struck wood. He gripped it with the 
grip of a drowning man and clung for dear life. 

It was a large square structure, planking braced with 
cross-pieces, almost a raft. He hung to the edge while 
the water ran out of his mouth and wits, and then, inch 
by inch, hauled himself cautiously further aboard, and, 
lying flat, looked anxiously about for signs of his ship- 
mates, but with little hope. 

He could see but a yard or two on either side, and 
then only the threatening welter of the monstrous green 
seas, terrifyingly close and swelling with menace. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


71 


Nothing? . . . Stay! — a white gleam under the green, 
like a scrap of paper in a whirlpool, and a desperate 
face emerged a yard or so away and a wildly-seeking 
hand. 

The anguished eyes besought him, and, not knowing 
what else to do, he gripped two of the cross-pieces of 
his raft and launched his legs out toward the drowning 
man. They were seized as in a cise, and presently, inch 
by inch, the gripping hands crept up his body till the 
other could lay hold of the raft for himself. And Wul- 
frey, turning, saw that it was the mate, Sheumaish 
Macro, whose life he had saved. 

They drew themselves cautiously up into such further 
safety as the frail ark offered and lay there spent. And 
Wulfrey, for one, wondered if the quicker end had not 
been the greater gain. 

XV 

Sleeping and eating anyhow and at any time, they had 
lost all count of time this last day or two. It was, how- 
ever, daylight of a kind, but so gray and murky and 
mixed with flying spume that they could see hut little. 

Neither man had spoken since they crawled up on to 
the raft. Death was so close that speech seemed futile. 
They both lay flat on their stomachs, gripping tight, 
and peering hopelessly through nearly closed eyes, ex- 
pectant of nothing, doubting the wisdom of their choice 
of the longer death. 

“God!” cried Macro of a sudden, as they swung up 
the back of a wave. “Where in ha’ we got to?” 

And Wulfrey got a glimpse of most amazing sur- 
roundings. 

Right ahead of them the sea was all abristle with 
what, to his quick amazed glance, looked like the bones 
and ribs of multitudinous ships, the ruins of a veritable 
Armada. 


72 


MAID OF THE MIST 


Now it was all hidden, as they sank into a weltering 
green valley with tumbling green walls all about them. 
Then the solid green bottom of their valley was ripped 
into furious white foam, and stark black baulks of 
timber came lunging up through it, all crusted with 
barnacles, festooned with hanging weeds, and laced with 
streaming white. They looked like grisly arms of deep- 
sea monsters reaching up out of the depths to lay hold 
of them. They seemed intent on impaling the frail raft. 
They seemed to change places, to dart hither and 
thither as though to head it off, to lie in wait for it, to 
spring up in its course. It was frightful and unnerv- 
ing. Wulfrey shut his eyes tight and set his teeth, and 
waited for the inevitable crash and the end. 

A great wave lifted them high above the venomous 
black timbers and, swinging on its course, dropped them 
as deftly as a crane could have done it, into the inside 
of a mighty cage. 

Wave after wave did its best to lift them out and 
speed them on. Their raft rose and fell and banged 
rudely against the ribs of their prison. Up and down 
they swung, and round and round, bumping and grind- 
ing till they feared the raft would go to pieces. But 
the tide had passed its highest and the storm was blow- 
ing itself out, and they had come to the end of the 
voyage. 

“We’re in hell,” gasped the mate, as he clung to the 
jerking cross-pieces to keep himself from being flung 
off, and to Wulfrey’s storm-broken senses it seemed 
that he was rights 

XVI 

Ann that night they swung and bumped inside their 
cage, with somewhat less of bodily discomfort as the 
wind fell and the sea went down, but only such small 


MAID OF THE MIST 73 

relief to their minds as postponement of immediate 
death might offer. 

Wulfrey lay prone on the raft, grimping to it me- 
chanically, utterly worn out with all he had gone 
through these last four days. He sank into a stupor 
again and lay heedless of everything. 

The tide fell to its lowest and was rising again when 
dawn came, and though the huge green waves still rolled 
through their cage, and swung them to and fro, and 
sent them rasping against its massive bars, they were 
as nothing compared with the waves of yesterday. 

It was the sound of Macro cracking shell-fish and 
eating them that roused Wulfrey. He raised his heavy 
head and looked round. The mate hacked off a bunch 
of huge blue-black mussels from the post they were 
grinding against at the moment, opened several of them 
and put them under his nose. Without a word he began 
eating and felt the better for them. 

Presently he sat up and looked about him in amaze- 
ment, and rubbed the salt out of his smarting eyes and 
looked again. 

“Where in heaven’s name are we he gasped. 

And well he might, for stranger sight no man ever 
set eyes on. 

“Last night I thocht we were in hell,” said Hacro 
grimly. “An’ seems to me we’re not far from it. We’re 
in the belly of a dead ship an’ there’s nought but dead 
ships round us.” 

Their immediate harbourage, into which the friendly 
wave had dropped them, was composed of huge baulks 
of timber like those that had tried to end them the night 
before, sea-sodden and crusted thick with shell-fish, and 
as Wulfrey’s eyes wandered along them he saw that the 
mate was right. They were undoubtedly the mighty 
weather-worn ribs of some great ship, canting up naked 
and forlorn out of the depths and reaching far above 
their heads. There in front was the great curving stem- 


74 


MAID OF THE MIST 


piece, and yon stiff straight piece behind was the stern- 
post. 

But when his eyes travelled out beyond these things 
his jaw dropped with sheer amazement. 

Everywhere about them, wherever he looked, and as 
far as his sight could reach, lay dead ships and parts 
of ships. Some, like their own, entire gaunt skeletons, 
but more still in grisly fragments. Close alongside them 
a great once-white, now weather-gray and ghostly fig- 
urehead representing an angel gazed forlornly at them 
out of sightless eyes. From the position of its broken 
arms and the round fragment of wood still in its mouth, 
it had probably once blown a trumpet, but the storm- 
fiends would have no music but their own and had long 
since made an end of that. 

Close beside it jutted up a piece of a huge mast, with 
part of the square top still on and ragged ropes trailing 
from it. Alongside it a bowsprit stuck straight up to 
heaven, defiant of fate, and more forlornly, a smaller 
ship’s whole mast with yards and broken gear still 
hanging to it all tangled and askew. And beyond, 
whichever way he looked — always the same, dead ships 
and the limbs and fragments of them. 

“It’s a graveyard,” he gasped. 

“Juist that,” said the mate dourly, “an’ we’re the 
only living things in it.” 

And presently, brooding upon it, he said, “There’ll 
be sand down below an’ they’re bedded in it. When tide 
goes down again maybe we can get out.” 

“Where to.?” 

“Deil kens! . . . But it cann’t be worse than stop- 
ping here.” 

The slow tide lifted them higher and higher within 
their cage, hiding some of the baleful sights but giving 
them wider view over the whole grim field. They sat, 
and by way of change stood and lay, on their cramped 
platform. They knocked off shell fish and ate them. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


75 


So far, so water-sodden had they been of late, they 
had not suffered from thirst, but the dread of it was 
with them. 

Then, slowly, the waters sank, and all the bristling 
bones of ships came up again. 

“Can you swim.^^” asked Macro abruptly at last. 

“I can. But I feel very weak. I can’t go far I’m 
afraid.” 

“We can’t stop on here.” 

“Where shall we go?’^ 

“Over yonder. They’re thickest there and they stand 
out more. Mebbe it’s shallower that way.” 

“I’ll do my best to follow you. If I can’t, you go on.” 

“Nay. You gave me a hand last night. We’ll stick 
together, and sooner we start the better. . . . Stay 

. . . mebbe we can ” and he began pounding at the 

end planks of their raft with his foot to start them 
from the cross-pieces. 

“’Twas the roof of the galley,” he explained, “and 
none too well made. It got stove in last voyage and 
we rigged this one up ourselves. My wonder is it held 
together in the night.” 

He managed at last with much stamping to loosen 
four boards. 

“One under each arm will help,” he said, “An’ we can 
paddle along an’ not get tired.” 

He let himself down into the water, shipped a board 
under each arm, and struck out between two of the 
gaunt ribs, and Wulfrey followed him, somewhat doubt- 
ful as to what might come of it. 

But the mate had taken his bearings and was follow- 
ing a reasoned course. Over yonder the wrecks lay 
thick. There might be one on which they could find 
shelter — even food. But that he hardlv dared to hope 
for. As far as he had been able to judge, at that dis- 
tance, they were all wrecks of long ago and mostly only 
bare ribs and stumps. 


76 


MAID OF THE MIST 


To Wulfrey, from water-level, the sea ahead seemed 
all abristle with shipping, as thick, he thought to him- 
self, as the docks at Liverpool. But there all was life 
and bustling activity, and here was only death, — dead 
ships and pieces of ships, and maybe dead men. The 
feeling of it was upon them both, ' and they splashed 
slowly along with as little noise as possible, as though 
they feared to rouse the sleepers who had once peopled 
all these gruesome ruins. 

‘‘See yon!” whispered Macro hoarsely, as he slowed 
up and waited for Wulfrey to, come alongside, and fol- 
lowing the jerk of his head Wulf saw the figure of a 
man grotesquely spread-eagled in a vast tangle of cord- 
age that hung like a net from a broken mast. 

“We had better see,” said Wulfrey, and kicked along 
towards it, the mate following with visible reluctance. 

It was the body of Jock Steele, the carpenter, livid 
and sodden, and many hours dead. 

“I would we hadna seen him,” growled Macro. 

“He’ll do us no harm. He was a decent man. I’m 
sorry he’s gone. Is there any chance of any of the 
others being alive.?” 

“Deil a chancel” 

“Still, we are ” 

“You had the deil’s own luck and it’s only by you 
I’m here. Let’s get on,” and they splashed on again. 

Past wreck after wreck, grim and gaunt and grisly, 
mostly of very ancient date, all swept bare to the bone 
by the fury of the seas, all with the water washing 
coldly through them. Now and again Macro growled 
terse comments, — 

“A warship, — from the size of her. See those ribs, 
they’ll last another hundred years. And yon’s a Dutch- 
man. They build stout too. Mostly British though, 
bound to be, hereabouts.” 

“Have you any idea where we are, then .?” 

“An idea — ay! I’ve heard tell o’ this place, but I 


MAID OF THE MIST 


77 


never met anyone had been here. They mostly never 
come back. They call it what you called it a while 
ago — ‘The Graveyard.’ ” 

“And where is it.^” 

“Sable Island, if I’m right, — ’bout one hundred miles 
off Nova Scotia.” 

“And is there any island.?” 

“Ay, — on the chart, but I never met any man had 
been there. We’re looking for it. There’s no depth here 
or all them ribs wouldn’t be sticking up like that. 
They’re stuck in the sand below. Must be over yonder 
where thejr lie so thick. . . . An’ a fearsome place when 
we get there, with the spirits of all them dead men all 
about it — hundreds of ’em, — thousands, mebbe.” 

“Do ships ever call there.?” 

“Not if they can help it, I trow. It’s Death brings 
’em and he holds ’em tight. . . . Hearken to that now !” 
— and he stopped as though in doubt about going 
further. 

And Wulfrey, listening intently, caught a faint thin 
sound of wailing far away in the distance. It rose and 
fell, shrill and piercing and very discomforting, though 
very far away. 

“What is it.?” he jerked. 

“Spirits,” breathed Macro, and his face was more 
scared and haggard even than before. 

“Nonsense!” said Wulfrey, with an assumption of 
brusqueness for his own reassurance, for this dismal 
progress through the graveyard was telling sorely on 
him also, and the sounds that came wavering across 
the water were as like the shrieking of souls in torment 
as anything he could imagine. “There are no such 
things. Don’t be a fool, man!” 

“Man alive! — no spirits.? The Islands are full o’ 
them, an’ this place fuller still. Yes, indeed!” 

But it was obviously impossible to float about there 
for ever. The water was not nearly so cold as Wulfrey 


78 


MAID OF THE MIST 


had expected, but the strain of the night and of the 
preceding days of semi-starvation had told on him, and 
he was feeling that he could not stand much more. He 
set off doggedly again towards the thickest agglomera- 
tion of dead shipping in front, and the mate followed 
him with a face full of foreboding. 

They went in silence, paying no heed now to the 
things they passed on the way, though the apparently 
endless succession of dead ships and the parts of them 
was not without its effect on their already broken 
spirits. 

“Gosh !” cried Macro of a sudden. “I touched 
ground or I’m a Dutchman! Ay — sand it is,” and 
Wulfrey sinking his feet found firm bottom. 

“Better keep the floats,” suggested the mate. “Mebbe 
it’s only the side of a bank we’re on.” 

They waded on, breast-deep, and presently were out 
of their depth again. But the feel of something below 
them, and the certainty that it was still not very far 
away, were cheering. In a few minutes they were walk- 
ing again, having evidently crossed a channel between 
two banks. And so, alternately walking and swimming, 
they drew at last towards the jungle of wreckage; and 
all the time, from somewhere beyond it, rose those 
piercing, wailing screams which Macro in his heart was 
certain came from the spirits of the dead. 

Here the water was no more than up to their knees 
and shoaling still, and they came now upon more than 
the bones of ships, — chaotic masses of masts and spars 
and rigging piled high and wide in fantastic confusion, 
and in among them, tangled beyond even the power of 
the seas to chase them further, barrels and boxes and 
crates, some stiU whole, mostly broken; rotting bales, 
and pitiful and ridiculous fragments of their contents 
worked in among them as if by impish hands. 

“Gosh, what wastry!” said Macro at the sight. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


79 


“There’s many a thousand pounds of goods piled here, 
— ay, hunderds of thousands, mebbe.” 

“I’d give it all for a crust of bread^’ said Wulfrey 
hungrily. 

“An’ mebbe there’s that too. If any o’ them casks has 
flour in ’em we needn’ starve. It cakes round the sides 
wi’ the wet, but the core’s all right.” 

Then, beyond the gigantic barrier of wastry, rose 
again that shrill screaming and shrieking, louder than 
ever, and Macro said “Gosh!” and looked like bolting 
back into the sea. 

Wulfrey, determined to fathom it, hauled himself 
painfully up a tangle of ropes and clambered to the top 
of the pile and saw, about a mile away, a narrow yellow 
spit of sand, and all about it a dense cloud of sea-birds, 
myriads of them, circling, diving, swooping, quarrelling. 

One moment the vast gray cloud of them drooped to 
the sea and seemed to settle there, the next it was whirl- 
ing aloft like a writhing water-spout, every component 
drop of which was a venomous bundle of feathers shriek- 
ing and screaming its hardest in the bitter fight for 
food. And the harsh and raucous clamour of them, 
each intent on its own, had in it something fiendishly 
inhuman and chilling to the blood. 

“It’s only sea-birds, man,” he cried to Macro. “Come 
up and see for yourself,” and the mate, with new life 
at the word, hauled himself up alongside and stood 
staring. 

“My Gosh I ... I never saw the like o’ that before,” 
he said at last. ‘There’s millions of ’em. They’re fight- 
ing . . . over our shipmates mebbe. ... We needn’ 
starve if we can get at ’em,” a sentiment which some- 
how, in all the circumstances of the case, did not greatly 
appeal to Wulfrey, hungry as he was. 

“If they all set on a man he wouldn’t have much 
chance,” he said, with a shiver. “They could pick him 
clean before he knew where he was.” 


80 


MAID OF THE MIST 


“It’s only dead men they feed on,” safd Macro, quite 
himself again, since it was only birds they had to deal 
with and not disembodied spirits. “There’s land. Let’s 
get ashore,” and they crawled precariously along over 
the wreckage, which sagged and dipped beneath them 
in places, and in places towered high and had to be 
scaled as best they could, and at times they had to 
wade or swim from pile to pile. 

Amazing things they chanced upon in their course, 
but were too intent on reaching land to give them more 
than a passing glance or a shudder. More than once 
they came on bones of men, jammed in tight among the 
raffle, and slowly picked by the sea and the things that 
lived in it till they gleamed white and polished and clean. 
And their grinning teeth, set in the awful fixed smile 
of the fleshless, seemed to welcome them as future re- 
cruits to their company. 

“Ah — am ! So you’ve come at last !” they seemed to 
say, as they laughed up at them out of holes and cor- 
ners. “We’ve been waiting for you all these years and 
here you are at last.” 

There were, too, bales and boxes of what had been 
rich cloths and silks and satins and coarser stuffs, 
worried open by the fret of the sea and reduced to 
sodden slimy punk, and casks and barrels beyond the 
counting. 

“Wastry! Wastry!” panted Macro. “We’ll come 
back sometime, mebbe.” 

But, for the moment, their only craving was for dry 
land, to savour the solid safety of it, and get some- 
thing to eat if they could, and a long long rest. 

With desperate determination they dragged their 
sodden and weary bodies through the shallows beyond, 
and blind fury filled them with spasmodic vigour as they 
saw what the sea-birds were feeding on. 

Over each poor body the carrion crew settled like 
flies, and tore and screamed and quarrelled. The two 


MAID OF THE MIST 


81 


living men dashed at them with angry shouts, and the 
birds rose in a shrieking host amazed at their interfer- 
ence. But only for a moment. They came swooping 
down again in a gray-white cloud, with raucous cries 
and eyes like fiery beads, and beat at them with their 
wings, and menaced them with already reddened beaks. 
And they looked so murderously intentioned that the 
men were fain to bow their heads and run, with flailing 
arms to keep them off. 

And so at last to dry land, and grateful they were 
for the feel of it, even though it seemed no more than 
a waste of sand but a few feet above tide-level. That 
last tussle with the birds had drained their strength 
completely. They dropped spent on the beach and 
lay panting. 

Their flight had set their chilled blood coursing 
again, a merciful sun had come up above the clouds 
that lay along the horizon, and in spite of their hunger 
and the fact that their very bones felt soaked with salt 
water, they both fell asleep where they lay. 


XVII 

WuLFREY was awakened by a sharp stab in the neck, 
and when he sat up with a start a huge cormorant 
squawked alfrightedly at the dead man coming to life 
again, and flapped away, gibbering curses and leaving 
a most atrocious stink behind him. 

The mate was still sleeping soundly, and Wulfrey, for 
the time being more painfully cognisant of the gnawing 
emptiness within than of the miracle that permitted him 
any sensation whatever, sat gazing anxiously about and 
revolving the primary problem of food. 

Out there among all that mass of wreckage it would 
be strange if they could not And something eatable, — 


82 


MAID OF THE MIST 


cores of flour barrels, perhaps pickled pork, rum almost 
certainly ; and the clammy void inside him craved these 
things most ardently. But he could not, as y^t, imagine 
himself venturing out there again to get- them. Later 
on perhaps, but for the present the land, such as it was, * 
must provide, for him at all events. He felt that he 
simply had not the heart or the strength to make the 
attempt. 

Let me say at once that the trying . of these men, 
which came upon them presently, was not in the matter 
of ways and means. It was of the spirit, not of the flesh. 
But yet it is necessary to show you how they came 
through these lesser trials of the flesh only to meet the 
greater trials of the spirit later on. And even these 
smaller matters are not entirely deviod of interest. 

Many birds came circling round expectantly, and 
swooped down towards the dark figures lying in the 
sand, and went off in shrill amazement when they were 
denied. And Macro at last stretched and yawned and 
sat up, staring dazedly at Wulfrey. 

“Gosh, but I’m hungered,” he said at last, as that 
paramount claim emphasised itself. “Any thing to 
eat.?” 

“I’m wondering. Plenty of birds, and very bad they 
smell. I’ve seen nothing else.” 

The mate got up heavily and found himself sore and 
stiff. He stood looking thoughtfully about him. 

“What about all that stuff.?” and he jerked his head 
towards the graveyard wreckage. 

“I couldn’t go again yet.” 

“Nor me either. . . . Ground’s higher over yonder,” 
he said. “Let’s go and see,” and they set off slowly 
over the sand. 

The level of high water was thickly strewn with sea- 
weed and small wreckage. The slope of the shore was 
so long and gentle that no large object could come in 
unless it were first broken into fragments outside. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


83 


The mate kicked over the sea-weed and found some 
which he put into his mouth. 

“Any good.?” asked Wulfrey anxiously, hungrier 
than ever at sight of the other’s working ajws. 

“Better’n nothing,” and he rooted up another piece 
and handed it over. Wulfrey found it tough and pun- 
gent of the sea and, after much chewing, capable of 
being swallowed, but the most he also could say for it 
was that it was just that much better than nothing. 

They each picked up a piece of wood with which to 
root in the tangle, and, bending and picking and munch- 
ing, made their way slowly towards the hummocks in 
front. 

These were a low range of sandhills, some of them as 
much as thirty feet high, and on the seaward side, which 
they climbed, they were sparsely clothed with coarse 
slate-green wire-grass about a foot in height, which 
bristled up like porcupines’ quills and helped to keep 
the loose soft sand together. They pulled some up to 
see if the roots looked edible, and found them spreading 
far and wide below ground in a matted tangle of white 
succulent-looking tendrils, which proved as tough and 
unsatisfying as the sea-weed, but had the advantage of 
a different flavour. 

Grubbing along, they climbed heavily through the 
yielding sand to the top of the nearest hummock. 
Macro, arriving there first, jerked a gratified “Gosh!” 
and floundered down the other side whirling his stick, 
and Wulfrey was just in time to catch the amazing 
sight of the whole surface of the little valley beyond 
in violent motion. 

He thought at first that something had gone wrong 
with his eyes, for everywhere he looked the sand seemed 
to be jumping and skipping and burying itself in itself. 
And then from the innumerable little flecks of white, 
bobbing spasmodically all over the place, he perceived 
that these were rabbits, and the mate was in among 


84 


MAID OF THE MIST 


them, knocking them on the head as fast as his stick 
could whirl. By the time Wulfrey reached him he was 
sitting in the sand, skinning one with his knife, and half 
a dozen more lay round him. 

‘‘Better than roots and seaweed,” he said, as he 
hacked the first in pieces and stuffed some into his 
mouth and handed some to Wulfrey. “There’s millions 
of ’em. We won’t starve,” and he started skinning 
another. 

Raw meat was a novelty, to Wulfrey at all events, 
but baby-rabbit flesh is eatable, even raw^ and it put 
new life into them both. 

The little valley in which they sat was like an oasis 
in the sandy desert outside. For here, among the wire- 
grass grew innumerable small creeping-plants and that 
sto sturdily though so modestly that, in spite of the 
vast horde of rabbits, the whole place was carpeted 
with green, and right in the centre, where the ground 
was lowest and the undergrowth thickest and darkest, 
was a considerabel pool of rainwater, which they found 
brackish but drinkable. 

“All we want now is shelter and fire, and we’ll live 
like kings and fighting-cocks,” said Macro, when he had 
time for anything but rabbit-flesh, and lay back com- 
fortably distent. 

“And where shall we find shelter and fire in this 
place 

“Man! There’s more’n we’ll ever need in all our 
lives, over yonder. But it’ll keep. . . . I’m not for 
going back there this day anyway. To-morrow, 

mebbe, ” he said drowsily, and presently they were 

both fast asleep again. And the rabbits came out at 
sunset and hopped about them, and sniffed them with 
quivering noses and disrelish, and the heavy dew fell 
on them, but they never woke. For Nature had now got 
all she needed for the reparation of the previous waste, 


MAID OF THE MIST 85 

and she was busily at work making good while they 
slept. 


XVIII 

Morning broke dull and heavy. The air was mild but 
full of moisture, and they were chilled with their long 
sleep in the open. 

“Gosh ! but Pd like to feel dry again,” said Macro, as 
they sat munching raw rabbit for breakfast. “D’you 
feel like going out yonder?” 

“I feel three times the man I was yesterday. But 
should we not go on further first? There may be some- 
one living on the island.” 

“Not a soul but us two, I warrant you.” 

“But since we’re here there might be others.” 

“That’s so. There might be, but not likely. It’s 
just luck, deil’s own luck, ’at those screeching deevils 
out yonder aren’t picking us to pieces like the rest.” 

“Say Providence, and I’ll agree with you,” said 
Wulfrey, who saw no need to ascribe to the devil so 
obviously good a work as far as they were concerned. 

“Ca’ it what you like, not one man in a thousand 
comes alive through what we came through. And Pm 
not forgetting that but for you I’d no be here myself. 
We can take a bit look round, but I’m sore set on a 
covering of some kind and a fire, and some rum would 
be cheerful. It’s in my bones that we’ll find all we 
want out there, and more besides.” 

So, after breakfast, they set off, carrying a couple 
of rabbits for provision by the way. 

Looking round from the top of the highest hummock, 
they saw the great twisting cloud of sea-birds hovering 
over the distant wreckage, and the shrill clamour of 
their screaming came faintly to them on the still air. 
They had cleaned up what the sea had stranded on 
the spit and had had to go further afield. 


86 


MAID OF THE MIST 


From this vantage point they could to some extent 
make out the lie of the island. It ran nearly west and 
east and the narrow sand-spit on which they had landed 
was the extreme western point. Where they stood, the 
land was about a quarter of a mile in width and it 
stretched away in front further than they could see, in 
vast stretches of sand with a line of hummocks all 
along the northern side. It seemed very narrow, just 
a long thing wedge of sand, with illimitable gray sea 
on each side, as far ag their eyes could reach. Right 
ahead, and about a mile away, was a great sheet of 
water, whether lake or inlet they could not tell. The 
hummocks ran along its northern side, and a narrow 
strip of sand divided it from the sea on the south. 

“We’d best keep to the ridges,” said Macro. “Yon 
spit on the other side may only end in the sea,” so 
they tramped on along the firm beach on the seaward 
slope of the line of hummocks, and every now and again 
climbed up to see what was on the other side. When 
they found themselves abreast of the sheet of water 
they went down and found it salt and very sahllow. It 
stretched away in front as far as they could see, but 
Macro thought he could see more sand hummocks at the 
far end. 

Every here and there, when they climbed the ridge 
to look over, they came on little basins like their own, 
comparatively green and populous with rabbits. But 
never a sign of human life or habitation, not a tree or 
a shrub, not an animal except the rabbits. 

“A God-forsaken hole,” was the mate’s comment, as 
they stood, after a couple of hours’ trudging, looking 
out over the interminable ridges in front, and the great 
unruffled sheet of water below, and the gray slow-heav- 
ing sea beyond on both sides, and the gray sky enclos- 
ing all. 

“There’s nought here and never has been. Let’s go 
back and get to work.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


87 


‘‘That lake, or inlet, or whatever it is, seems to nar- 
row over there. Suppose we see where it goes to,” 
suggested Wulfrey. 

“Only back into sea, I reckon.” 

However, they tramped on along the beach, and next 
time they looked over the ridge the land below had 
broadened out. The water had shrunk to a mere chan- 
nel which ran, they, saw, not into the sea but into a 
still larger lake beyond, unless it in turn should prove 
to be a long arm of the sea running all through the 
middle of the island. The could follow the low sand- 
spit which divided it from the sea on the south side, 
and the long line of hummocks on the north, till they 
faded out of sight in the distance. 

Right in front of them spread the largest valley they 
had yet come across, and the coast ridges ran down into 
the middle of it and ended in the highest hill they had 
seen, and between the hill and the lake lay a number of 
large ponds. 

“We must get up there,” said Wulfrey. 

“No manner o’ use,” growled the mate, who found 
tramping through the sand very tiring, and was eager 
to get back and attack the wreckage for shelter and 
fire and food and rum. 

“Stop you here then. Macro, and I’ll go on. If there’s 
anything to see I’ll wave my arms. You might skin 
those rabbits too. I’m beginning to feel empty again.” 

He struck straight across the valley to the ponds, 
and was delighted to find them fresh and much better 
to the taste than their own little pool. Then he climbed 
the hill, which was not far short of a hundred feet in 
height. And then Macro, who had been watching him 
intermittently as he hacked at the rabbits, saw him 
wave his arms in so excited a fashion that he picked up 
the rabbits and ran, wondering what ne;^^ thing he’d 
found now that set him dancing in that fashion. 

And when at last he panted heavily up the yielding 


88 


MAID OF THE MIST 


side of the hill and saw, he gasped “Gosh !” with all the 
breath he had left, and sat down open-mouthed and 
stared as if he could not believe his eyes. 

Beyond the end of the valley, the great lake stretched 
away further than they could see, and in a (Jeep bend 
on the north side of it lay two ships. 

“Schooners, b’ Gosh!” jerked Macro, as soon as he 
could speak ; and eyed them intently. “How in name of 
sin did they get there.?” and his eye travelled quickly 
along the sand-spit that shut out the sea, in search of 
the break in it through which the schooners must have 
entered. But no break was visible. Still it might well 
be that this great inland lake joined the outer sea some- 
where over there, beyond their range of sight, and that 
this was a harbour of refuge, though he had certainly 
never heard of it before. 

“We must find out about ’em,” he said at last, and 
they set oflp at speed towards the ships to which his 
eyes seemed glued. 

“Not a sign of a man aboard either of ’em,” he jerked 
one time, as he lurched up out of a rabbit-hole. “Nor 
ashore either.” 

And to Wulfrey also there was something strange 
and uncanny in the look of them. The absence of any 
slightest sign of life anywhere about imparted to them 
something of a lifeless look also. And their masts were 
bare of sails, spars, or even cordage, just bare poles 
sticking up out of the hulls like blighted pine trees. 
The sea outside had a long slow heave in it, but the 
water of the lake was smooth as a pond, not a pulse in 
it, not a ripple on it, and the two little ships lay as 
motionless as toy boats on a looking-glass sea. 

Macro was evidently much exercised in his mind. He 
never took his eyes off the ships. So intent was he 
on them that he stumbled in and out of rabbit holes 
without noticing them, and the “Gosh!” that jerked 


MAID OF THE MIST 89 

out of him now and again was provoked entirely by 
the puzzle of the ships. 

So they came at last round the curve of the land and 
stood opposite the nearer of the two, which lay about a 
hundred yards out from the shore of bare sand, and 
neither on ship nor shore nor water had they discovered 
any sign of life. 

“Schooner a-hoy!” bellowed the mate through his 
funnelled hands. And again. “Schooner a-hoy !” 

But no sudden head bobbed up at the hail^ and but 
that they were whole and afloat the ships looked as dead 
as those others out past the point. 

“Gosh, but it’s odd !” and he looked quickly both 
ways along the shore and over his shoulders, as though 
he feared some odd thing might start up suddenly and 
take him unawares. “What’s it mean.f”’ 

“There’s no one there. They’re deserted.” 

“Deserted? Man alive! Who’d desert ships afloat 

like that? What in does it mean?” his native 

fears of the unnatural and inexplicable getting the 
better of him. 

“We’d better go and see,” said Wulfrey. 

“Swim.f^” 

“I suppose so. I don’t expect we can wade.” 

The mate shook his head. He had evidently no liking 
for the job, keen as was his desire to get to the bottom 
of it. 

“Let’s feed first anyway,” he said, and produced the 
rabbits, which he had held on to in spite of his surprise 
and many stumblings. So they sat in the sand and ate 
raw rabbit, with their eyes on the ships all the time. 

“They’re dead ships like all the rest,” was the sum 
of Macro’s conclusions. “But how they got there beats 
me flat.” 

“They’re afloat anyway and they’ll be better to sleep 
in than the sandhills.” 


90 


MAID OF THE MIST 


“Ay — mebbe, — if so be’s there’s no dead men aboard 
— or ghosts.” 

“There’s no ghosts anyway. If there are any dead 
men we’ll bury them decently and ocupy their bunks.” 

At which the mate gave a shiver of distaste and 
chewed on in silence. 

“Isn’t it possible there’s an opening to the sea over 
yonder asked Wulfrey, with an eastward jerk of the 
head. 

‘Mebbe, but I don’t think it. There’s no seaweed 
here, and no move in the water, and no tide-mark. It’s 
dead level. But what if there is.?” 

“Why, then they might have got in that way, and 
then some storm blocked the opening and they couldn’t 
get out.” 

“Mebbe. We can find out by travelling along yon 
spit till we get to the end of it. I’d liefer do that than 
go aboard.” 

“We’ll sleep better on board than on the sand.” 

“Man, ye don’t know what ill things may be aboard 
yon ships ! There’s a wrong look about ’em,” which 
was undeniable, but still not enough to commend the 
chill sand to Wulfrey as a resting-place when shelter 
and possibly bunks might be had on board. 

“It seems to me,” he said,^.as they finished their meal, 
“that it doesn’t matter much how they got there. We 
can perhaps find that out later. There they are, and if 
they’re habitable we want to make use of them. I’m 
going to swim out to this nearest one and find out 
what’s the matter.” 

“If you go I go,” grumbled the mate uncheerfully. 

“It’s evident there’s no one aboard or anywhere 
about, and it’s absurd to sit here looking at them,” said 
Wulf, and began to peel off his clothes, which had got 
almost dry with walking. “No good getting them wet 
again,” he explained. “I’ve been all of a chill for the 
last five days. I’ll fasten them on to my head.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


91 


“We’ll be coming back.” 

“We might decide to stop there all night. Better 
take what’s left of the meat.” 

“Gosh !” with a perceptible shiver of distaste again. 

However, he peeled also, and by careful contrivance 
with belt and braces they bound their bundles on to 
their heads and stepped into the water. 

“Phew ! It’s cold, — ^^colder than the sea,” said 
Wulfrey through tight-set teeth, as they struck out. 

“’Tis that,” and the mate’s teeth chittered visibly, 
between the chill of the water and distaste of the adven- 
ture. 

“Temperature ought to be same ... if sea comes 
in,” sputtered Wulfrey. 

“’Tisn’t, all same. It’s cauld as death.” 

They ploughed along till they reached the nearer 
ship, and swam round it in search of entrance, and 
failing other means laid hold of the rusty anchor-chain, 
which peeled in ruddy flakes at their touch. By the 
time Wulf tumbled in over the bows he was streaked 
from head to foot with iron-mould, and presented so 
ghastly an appearance that Macro’s jaw fell as he came 
up the side, and he looked half inclined to drop back 
into the water. 

“Man! You look awful. I tuk you for a ghost,” he 
gasped in a whisper. 

“You’re nearly as bad yourself, but I took the cream 
of it. Now let us see what’s what.” 

The mate’s experienced eye showed him at once that 
the condition of the ship was not due to storm or acci- 
dent. She had been deliberately stripped of everything 
that could be turned to account elsewhere. She was 
bare as a board, — not a rope nor a spar was left. The 
hatches were closed and looked as though they had not 
been touched for years. 

They came to the fore-hatch leading down to the 


92 


MAID OF THE MIST 


fo’c’s’le, and he hauled it up with some difficulty and 
looked suspiciously down into the darkness within. 

“Below there !” he cried, in a repressed hollow voice. 
But only the echoes answered him. 

They passed the main-hatch leading to the hold, and 
went along, past a grated skylight thick with green 
mould, to the covered gangway leading to the officers’ 
quarters. The doors were closed and bolted with rusty 
bolts. There could not by any possibility be anyone 
below, not anyone alive, that is. 

Macro wasted no breath here, when they had man- 
aged to undo the bolts, but he visibly hesitated. Wulf 
stepped down into the cabin, and he followed. 

Just bare walls, nothing more. Table, stools, lamps, 
everything movable or unscrewable had been carried 
away. In the four small rooms adjacent there were 
just four empty bunks and not a thing besides. 

“Gosh, but it’s queer!” whispered Macro. “Mebbe 
they’re all lying dead in the hold.” 

“We’ll make sure,” and they went up on deck again, 
and with some labour, for the wood had swelled and 
stuck, got up the main hatch and dropped down into 
the hold. 

But that was bare like the rest. The ship was as 
empty as a drum. 

“Not so much as a rat, b’ Gosh!” said the mate, 
with recovered spirits, seeing no sign of dead men or 
ghosts. 

“What do you make of it.?” asked Wulf. 

“She’s been stripped bare, that’s plain. But why, 
beats me.” 

“Anyway, there’s no objection to our stopping here 
now, I suppose. Bare bunks will be drier than the sand 
over there.” 

“That’s so. . . . And I’m thinking that if we can 
bring over some of the stuff from that big pile out yon- 
der we can make ourselves mighty comfortable here.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


‘‘We can start on that tomorrow. We’ve done enough 
for one day.” 

“We’ll make a raft, like old Robinson Crusoe, and 
bring the stuff right down to the spit yonder,” said 
Macro, waxing quite cheerful at the prospect. “Then 
we’ll make a smaller raft to bring it aboard here.” 

“We’d better walk along that spit tomorrow and see 
if there’s any opening to the sea.” 

“We can do that, but I doubt there’s not, else this 
water wouldn’t be so cold, and there’d be some move- 
ment in it. It’s all dead like everything else.” 

They spent the rest of the daylight poking into every 
corner of the ship, and in the dark fo’c’s’le Macro made 
a find of surpassing worth. 

He had rooted everywhere, with a natural enjoyment 
in the process, and come on nothing but bare boards. 
“But you never know,” he said, and went on rooting. 
And in the blackest corner his foot struck something 
loose which slid away and eluded him. He went down 
on his hands and knees and groped till he found it, 
and then gave a triumphant shout which brought up 
Wulfrey in haste. 

It was a small round metal box such as was used 
for carrying flint and steel and tinder, well-worn and 
battered, but tightly closed, and the mate’s fingers 
trembled with anxiety as he opened it with his knife. 

“Thanks be!” he breathed deeply, for there in the 
little battered box lay all the possibilities of fire, — 
warmth, cooked food, life — all complete. 

And — “Thank God!” said Wulfrey also. “That’s 
the best find yet.” 

“If it’ll work it’s worth its weight in Guinea gold. 
But it’s old, old,” and he poked the tinder doubtfully 
with his finger, “as old as the ship, and that’s older 
than you or me. I’m thinking. It’s dropped out of 
some old pocket and rolled >'Out of sight. We do have 
the deil’s own luck.” 


94 


MAID OF THE MIST 


“Providence !” said Wulfrey. “Can’t we make a fire 
and roast some rabbit? I’m sick of raw meat.” 

“Where’d we make it? Galley-stove’s gone with all 
the rest, and galley too for that matter. . . . Wouldn’t 
do to set the ship afire. . . . There’s only one safe 
way. Soon as we’ve got a bit of a raft together we’ll 
bring over sand enough to make a fire-bed in the hold. 
Then we can roast all the rabbits in the island.” 

“What about the cover of the big hatchway there? 
Wouldn’t that carry one of us and sand enough.” 

“Might. And there’s wood enough and to spare in 
the skin of her down below. But it’ll be dark in an 
hour.” 

“Come on. Let’s get it overboard. I’ll go. Can you 
rip up a board for a paddle?” 

The hatch-cover was slightly domed and had four- 
inch coamings all round, and when let upside down on 
to the water made a sufficiently effective raft for light 
freight. Macro dropped down into the hold and ripped 
up a board and jumped it into pieces, and Wulfrey low- 
ered himself gingerly down on to his frail craft and set 
off for the shore, with roast rabbit in his face. 

“Ye’ll have to look smart or ye’ll be in the dark,” 
Macro called after him, as he leaned over the side 
watching his clumsy progression. 

“Ay, ay! I’ll shout if I get lost,” and the mate 
went down to break up firewood and shred filmy shav- 
ings in default of sulphur sticks. 

Wulfrey, wafting slowly ashore, lighted on a colony 
of rabbits intent on supper, and was able to capture a 
couple in their panic rush for their holes. Then he 
hastily loaded his float with all the sand it could safely 
carry and set off again for the ship in great content of 
mind. 

The transfer of his cargo to the deck of the ship was 
a much more difficult and precarious job than getting 
it alongside. He tried throwin git up in handfuls, but 


MAID OF THE MIST 


95 


that proved slow work and more than once came near 
to spilling him overboard. And finally, as the night 
was upon them, he took off his coat and sent up larger 
parcels in it; and so at last Macro cried enough, and 
having shown him how to wedge his float in between 
the rusty anchor-chain and the bows, so that the wind 
should not drift it away in the night, he helped him 
up over the side. 

It was an anxious moment when the first sparks 
shredded down into the ancient tinder. But they caught 
and glowed, and with tenderest coaxing lighted the 
mate’s carefully-prepared matches, and These the chips, 
and these the faggots, and the mighty cheer and joy 
of fire were theirs. . 

They slept that night in great comfort, replete with 
roasted meat, roofed from winds and dew, and grateful 
both, each in his own way, for the marvellous encour- 
agement of this first day on the island. 

Though their beds were but bare boards, they had no 
fault to find with them, but slept like tops. And Macro’s 
black head was so full of the wonderful possibilites of 
that vast pile of wastry out beyond the point, in con- 
junction with this amazing find of the ships, that there 
was no room left in it for any thought of ghosts or 
evil spirits. 

XIX 

Over their last night’s fire they had made provision of 
roast meat for breakfast, and after it they paddled 
precariously across to the other schooner, a couple of 
hundred yards away, and explored it thoroughly. But 
it was in exactly the same condition as their own, so 
they closed all the hatches again and then, after a short 
discussion, decided to leave the solution of the puzzle of 
the ships for the present and devote the day to the 


96 


MAID OF THE MIST 


salvage of any necessaries they could discover among 
the wreckage. 

They paddled across to the southern spit which 
divided the lake from the sea, and found it a bare hun- 
dred yards in width, and at its highest point not more 
than ten feet above high-water level. They walked 
briskly along the side of the narrow channel that joined 
the two lakes, on past the first one, and in a couple of 
hours reached the sandy point where they had landed 
two days before. Out above the piles of wreckage the 
gray cloud of sea-birds swung and whirled, and their 
shrill screamings rose and fell with the varied fortunes 
of their quest. 

“Screeching deevils!” was the mate’s comment on 
them, and presently, “It’ll be a long pull back with a 
log of a raft. It must be six or seven miles, I reckon.” 

“Perhaps we’ll strike a boat among the wreckage.” 

“Ah — p’r’aps. We do have the deil’s own luck.” 

It was almost dead low water. The storm of the 
previous days seemed to have exhausted the elements 
for the time being. The sea was smooth, with no more 
movement than the long slow heave which curled, as it 
neared the shore, into great green and white combers 
of exquisite beauty, rushing up the beaches in a dapple 
of marbled foam, and back into the bosom of the next 
comer with a long-drawn sibilant hiss. 

There was a soft south-west wind and even a cheering 
touch of the sun, and as their work was like to be of 
the wettest, and dry clothes were a luxury, they left 
them above tide-level and went out stripped to the fight, 
their only weapon the mate’s sailor’s-knife in the belt 
which he buckled round his waist. But, in view of the 
screeching deevils already in possession, they fore- 
thoughtfully armed themselves with the weightiest clubs 
they could pick out of the raffle of the beach. For in 
that countless predatory host, although its components 
were but birds, there was menace passing words. It 


MAID OF THE MIST 97 

made them feel bare and vulnerable, and Macro cursed 
them heartily as he went. 

They reached the pile without any difficulty, and the 
mate’s keen eye raked round for the likeliest stuff for 
a raft. It was no good acquiring cargo till they had 
a craft to carry it. 

There was no lack of timber, however, and cordage 
was to be had for the cutting, and with these the skilled 
hands of the seaman soon constructed a raft large 
enough for their utmost probable requirements. Then 
he turned with gusto to the more satisfying joys of 
plunder, and developed new and startling sides to his 
character. 

Wulf laughed, but found him surprising, as the 
cateran spirit of his forebears came uppermost with 
this tremendous opportunity. 

He climbed up and down and in and out of the high- 
piled wreckage like a hungry tiger, bashed in boxes 
and cases with a hugh club of mahogany which had 
once adorned the cabin-staircase of a ship, and raked 
over their contents with the avidious claws of a wrecker 
of the evil coasts. Now and again strange ejaculations 
broke from him. More than once, in the wild glee of 
pillage and unexpected booty, he shouted snatches of 
weird runes and chanties which Wulf supposed were 
Gaelic. At times he stood and shook his fist at the 
screaming, birds that swooped about him, and cursed 
them volubly. And once, Wulfrey, on the raft below, 
knitted his brows and watched him with doubtful per- 
plexity as, in the disappointment of his hopes respect- 
ing one great case which had resisted his efforts and 
finally yielded nothing of consequence, he attacked 
another with shouts of fury and a Berserk madness that 
scattered chips and splinters far and wide. An incau- 
tious cormorant swooped by him. With a stroke he 
sent it spinning, a bruised and broken bundle of feath- 
ers, and it fell with a dull flop into the sea. 


98 


MAID OF THE MIST 


The man seemed demented, drunk with a rage for 
plunder and the destruction of everything that stood 
between him and it. His great club whirled, and the 
blows flailed here and there without any apparent 
regard to direction. The lust of slaughter and demol- 
ishment burst from him in volcanic fire and fury. For 
the moment he had reverted to his elemental type. 

To the cooler head below he looked dangerous. 
Wulfrey’s amused amazement gave place to doubt and 
a touch of anxiety. He could only hope that his com- 
panion was not often subject to fits such as this. 

But the Berserk madness was not wholly without 
method, and presently plunder of all kinds came rain- 
ing down on the raft. 

Heralded by a sharp ‘Below there !” came a roll of 
linen and one of woolen cloth, a bale of blankets, more 
rolls, — this time of silk and satin and velvet, all more 
or less damaged by the sea, though they were the pick 
and cream of his salvaging, and all no doubt dryable. 

“Good heavens! What does he want with these .P” 
thought Wulfrey, but piled them up obediently. 

Then, following the unmistakable course of the 
marauder up above, and clawing the raft along to keep 
in touch with him, down came on his head a bulging 
little sack, which felt like beans but proved to be coffee, 
and presently, after a pause, necessitated by packing 
arrangements up above, a series of soft bundles made 
up in crimson silk and tied with slimy rope. 

Then, after another pause punctuated by shouts and 
crashes, down came a rattling heap of rusty cooking 
utensils all slung together with more slimy rope, a 
rusty axe, four broken oars. Till at last the raft 
became so crowded that there was barely standing room 
left on it. 

“Steady, above there! We’re full up. I can’t take 
another pound, and I doubt if we can get this all home 
safely.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


99 


‘‘Just this, man !” and Macro appeared up above 
with a small keg in his arms, and let himself and it 
carefully down on to the raft, with every appearance 
of a return to sanity. 

“Man !” he said, with the afterglow of it all still in 
his face. “That was fine. We’ll come again.” 

“We’ve got to get all these things home first.” 

“Easy that. This wind’ll carry us fine,” and he set 
to work with a couple of the broken oars and a blanket, 
and contrived a sail of sorts. Then, taking another 
oar and thrusting one into Wulfrey’s hands, he pro- 
pelled the clumsy raft along the side of the wreckage 
till it got clear, and the wind caught their sail and 
wafted them slowly towards the island. 

“A grand grand place, yon!” he broke out again. 
“There’s stuff enough there to load a hundred ships. 
. . . Gosh, I’ve forgotten the pork!” and he uprooted 
the sail and began paddling back to the wreckage. “I 
stove in the head of a barrel and was smelling at it 
when I spied the wee keg.” 

“Was it eatable.^” 

“I’ve eaten worse.” 

“Couldn’t we get it next trip.?*” 

“Man, my stomach’s been crying for it ever since I 
set eyes on it. ‘Sides, those deevils of birds will finish 
it in no time. See them! They’s at it now. Och, ye 
greedy deevils !” 

He clambered up the pile with his oar and laid about 
him lustily. The birds rose up from the meat like a 
dense cloud of flies, and screamed and raved at him, and 
swooped at him with vicious eyes and beaks and claws, 
sp that in a moment he became the centre of a writhing, 
fluttering, shrieking mass which threatened to anni- 
hilate him completely. 

He flailed blindly at them with his oar, smashing them 
by dozens. But they were too many for him. He 
shouted for help, and when Wulfrey scrambled up he 


100 


MAID OF THE MIST 


found him in very sore case, fighting blindly and stream- 
ing with blood. 

“Come away, man!” shouted Wulfrey, and thrashed 
away at the nightmare of whirling birds. “Come away 
before they end us I” and in a moment he found himself 
the centre of a similar shrieking mass, dazed and 
blinded with their numbers and their fury. The terrified 
glimpse he got of their cold glittering eyes and gnash- 
ing beaks, and the compressed venom of their over- 
whelming assault, were too much for him. It was like 
fighting single-handed against all the fiends out of the 
pit. 

He hurled his oar overboard, put up his arms to 
protect his eyes, and staggered to the edge of the pile, 
acutely conscious of jags and pecks and rips innumer- 
able on his bare arms and shoulders. As he flung himself 
down into the water and dived under, a plunge alongside 
told him that Macro had done the same. A raucous 
swarm of birds followed them, but on their disappear- 
ance fluttered off to more visible chances above. 

“Man ! but that was awful 1” gasped the mate 
hoarsely. “They nigh ate me alive.” 

“Let’s get aboard or they’ll be at us again. There’s 
my oar,” and he swam quietly to it and they climbed 
back on to the raft. 

“An’ never ae piece o’ pork,” lamented Macro. “The 
poaching deevils !” 

“Be thankful you’re alive, man ! It was a close touch 
that.” 

“’Twas that. I’m bit all over. I’d like to end ’em all 
with one crack.” 

Fortunately the birds were too busy quarrelling up 
above to give them more than cursory attention. A few 
came whirling and swooping after them with greedy 
eyes and ravening beaks. But it was only in their 
multitudes that they were formidable and they soon 
gave up a chase that offered no easy prey. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


101 


The men, shaken and trembling, clawed along the 
pile till they caught the wind again, when Macro read- 
justed his masts and sail, and they drifted slowly back 
towards the island. 

“Ye deevils! Ye scraiching, scrawming, skelloching 
deevils I” breathed Macro deeply, every now and again, 
and shook his fist at the twisting column of birds behind. 
“I wish ye had ae neck and me ma hond on it.” 

Their weighty progress was of the slowest. When 
they drew alongside the yellow spit Macro plunged 
overboard and waded ashore for their clothes, and they 
drifted on along the low southern beach. But it was 
well after mid-day before they came abreast of the stark 
little ships which stood to them for home. 

Then they made busy traffic transporting their sal- 
vage to the shore and carrying it across the bank to 
the edge of the lake. And when that was all done Macro 
unlashed the raft and they carried it over piece by 
piece, and roughly put it together there and loaded 
up again. 

“It’ll all come in for firing,” said the mate. “We 
can’t go on burning our own inside all the time.” 

It was no easy working propelling their rough craft 
with broken oars. Moreover Macro insisted on taking 
the hatch-cover in tow. But the spirit of accomplish- 
ment was upon them and the weight they dragged was 
a comforting one. 

All the way, as they joggled slowly along, the mate 
never ceased enlarging on the wonders of the wreckage, 
nor forgot his one disappointment, which evoked resent- 
ful curses each time he thought of it. 

“Man, but we’re doing fine! A roof we’ve got, and 
fire, and things to eat. — There’s flour in yon bundles, — 
just the cores of half a dozen casks. And yon bag’s 
coffee, but we’ll need to roast it and grind it. And the 
wee keg’s rum, unless I’ve mistook it. An’ there’s 
enough stuff out yonder to last us for a thousand years. 


102 


MAID OF THE MIST 


But, blankety-blank-blank-blank! — my stomach’s cry- 
ing after yon pork that them screeching deevils took 
out of our mouths, as you might say. Blankety-blank- 
blank ’em all — every red-eyed son o’ the pit among ’em ! 
But we’ll try again, and next time I’ll not broach the 
barr’l an’ they’ll know noth’n about it.” 

“Maybe they’ll attack us all the same. It was the 
most horrible situation I was ever in. One felt so 
utterly helpless.” 

Ay, blank ’em! There was no end to ’em. . . . 
They’d have ate me alive if you hadn’t come and helped 
me tumble overboard. Blank ’em! Blank ’em! Blank 
’em !” 

“What on earth are all these things for.?” asked 
Wulfrey one time, kicking a roll of crimson silk with 
his heel. 

“Blankets to sleep on, — better than boards. The 
others for their gay gaudery, — the bonny reid and blue 
o’ them. They mek me feel good and_ warm just to 
look at ’em. I just couldna leave them. Man, they’re 
grand !” 

They hoisted all their stuff on board, and found 
themselves hungry and thirsty with the heavy day’s 
work. There were but the scantiest remnants of their 
breakfast left, and Macro undertook to chop wood and 
make a fire, scour some of the rusty cooking-utensils, 
and make flour-and-water cakes as soon as he had some 
water, if Wulfrey would go across for it and some 
fresh meat. 

So he set off on the hatch-cover with a good-sized 
kettle, and was back inside an hour with water from the 
ponds by the hill and a couple of young rabbits, and 
found that the mate had not been idle. He had trans- 
ferred a sufficiency of sand to the cabin to make a 
hearth at the foot of the steps, and had broken up 
wood enough to last for a week. He had spread out 
all the blankets, scoured most of the rust off a frying- 


MAID OF THE MIST 


103 


pan and a small kettle and a couple of tin pannikins, 
and had opened the keg and sampled its contents and 
found it French cognac of excellent quality. ' 

In the best of spirits he skinned the rabbits and set 
them roasting, with an incidental commination of thae 
screeching deevils that had robbed them of the pork 
which would have been such a welcome accompaniment. 
Then he compounded cakes of flour and water and 
fried them deftly, and set a kettle to boil wherewith 
to make hot grog, and boastfully promised coffee for 
the morrow when he had time to roast and grind it. 

They both ate ravenously, and found great content 
in the taste of hot food and drink once more, after all 
these days of clammy starvation, and then they slept. 
And Wulfrey dreamed horribly all night of fighting 
helplessly with legions of screeching birds, and several 
times fought himself awake, and each time found Macro 
actively engaged in the same unprofitable business. 


XX 

In spite of his torn shoulders and unrestful night. 
Macro was for setting off again first thing next morn- 
ing for more plunder. That huge pile of wastry drew 
him like a magnet. He hungered and thirsted to be 
at it again. 

But Wulfrey flatly refused. They had enough to go 
on with, and he claimed at least a day to recover from 
the effects of the last excursion. And as Macro 
declined to tackle the ojb single-handed he was fain 
to agree, though with none too good a grace. 

“This weather mayn’t last. We’d best get all we 
can while we can,” he urged. 

“The stuff will be there tomorrow. Most of it’s been 
there for years, you said.” 


104 


MAID OF THE MIST 


“Ay, but man, there’s mebbe things out of the ‘Grass- 
adoo,” that’ll be spoiling for want of finding.” 

‘They’ll not spoil much more in one day. You’re 
more used to this kind of work than I am, you see. I 
must have a rest.” 

Macro consigned rest to the bottomless pit, but after 
relieving his feelings in that way, consented at last to 
an easy-going exploration of the southern spit, to see 
if their lake opened into the sea, though he expressed 
himself satisfied, from his observations, that it did not. 

First, however, out of the larger raft he constructed 
a smaller one, which bore them better than the hatch- 
cover and was more manageable, and the hatch they 
hauled on board again and fitted into its place, so as 
to keep the ship dry in case of bad weather. Then they 
paddled across to the spit and set off along it, both 
scrutinising the lie of the land carefully. 

For a good hour they trudged through heavy sand, 
the sea swirling with long soft hisses up the yellow 
beach on their right hand, and on their left the placid 
water of the lake without a pulse in it. The dividing 
bank was nowhere in all its length more than a hundred 
yards wide, nor more than ten feet high at its crown. 

More than once Macro stood and studied it in places, 
and when in time they came to long ridges of hum- 
mocks which stretched as far in front as they could see, 
he stood again, looking back from the top of the first 
they climbed, and said, “I’m thinking there’s no open- 
ing this end. Mebbe it was on the level there. But this 
stuff shifts so in a gale you never know where you are.” 

Presently they came on the shallow rounded end of 
the lake, with higher sandhills beyond it, which ran 
along both sides of the island further than they could 
see. In between lay a vast unbroken stretch of level 
sand, and when they climbed to the top of the highest 
hill, they saw this sandy desert dwindle in the far dis- 


MAID OF THE MIST 


105 


tance to a point, with the sea on each side of it, like 
the one at the other end of the island. 

“There’s not a sign of anybody else,” said Wulfrey. 

“If there’d been anyone they’d bin living on them 
ships. We’ve got it all to ourselves, that’s certain. 
And’ what’s more, we’ll have it all to ourselves till iKng- 
dom come. No one else’ll ever come, ’cept dead men.” 

“Those two ships came.” 

“Twenty, thirty years ago, — mebbe more. Must have 
bin an opening then and it’s got silted up. They 
couldn’t have got washed over the spit.” 

There were several more large fresh-water ponds' 
close to these larger hills, and rabbits everywhere. They 
secured a couple and tramped back the way they had 
come. 

Macro seemed to accept the whole situation and out- 
look with the utmost equanimity. They had very much 
more than they had had any right to expect; more 
was always to be had for the fetching from that won- 
derful pile out yonder; what that pile might yield in 
the way of richer plunder remained to be seen, and he 
was the man to see to it. 

But Wulfrey had been cherishing a hope that the 
great lake would prove an inlet from the sea, a harbour 
of refuge into which other ships might be expected to 
run at times. And the fact that it was not, that no 
relief was to be looked for in that direction and that 
this desolate sandbank, bristling with wrecks, must nec- 
essarily be shunned by all who knew of it, weighed more 
and more heavily on him as he thought about it. 

They were alive, where all their shipmates had per- 
ished. They were provided for beyond their utmost 
expectation. For all that he w£^s most deeply grateful. 
But the prospect of passing the rest of his life on 
this bare bank troubled him profoundly and reduced 
him to silence and the lowest of spirits. 


106 


MAID OF THE MIST 


XXI 

They woke next morning into a dense white fog, so 
thick that they could not see across the deck. Macro, 
intent on plunder, hailed it as an excellent screen from 
possible attack by the other pillagers of the wreck-pile, 
and though Wulfrey had his doubts, he would not 
counter him again. 

His knowledge of human nature suggested to him the 
almost impossibility of two men living alone, in inti- 
macy so close and exclusive, and with so little outlet 
for their thoughts and energies, without coming to 
loggerheads at times. He determined that, so far as 
in him lay, the provocation thereto should not come 
from him. 

So far he had not only had nothing to complain of in 
his companion’s presence, but, on the contrary, had 
found himself distinctly the gainer by it in every mate- 
rial way. But the strange wild outbursts, to which he 
had given vent when they were .at the wreckage before, 
warned him of hidden fires below, and suggested the 
advisability of non-provocation of the under-man, if it 
were possible to avoid it. 

So they paddled across to the spit, which they could 
not well miss, and set off on foot for the point, steering 
by the sullen lap and hiss of the waves as they stole 
softly up out of the fog on their left hand. There 
was a clamminess in the air whjch commended the idea 
of clothes to them while they worked on the pile. So 
they made their things into tight bundles, and carried 
them above their heads as they waded out neck-deep to 
their store-house. The shrill cries of the birds came 
dull and thin through the fog, more ghostly than ever 
from their invisibility. Now and again an inquisitive 
straggler fluttered down at them out of the close white 


MAID OF THE MIST 


107 


curtain, and whirled back into it with a terrified squawk 
when it found they were alive. 

They climbed the pile cautiously, but the birds seemed 
mostly at a distance; and when they had flung down 
sufficient timber Macro proceeded to construct another 
raft, while Wulfrey poked about up above on his own 
account. 

And as hfe climbed about among the chaotic mass of 
barrels, boxes, cases, bales, he came to understand the 
wild craving to get at them, to bash them open and 
learn what they contained, which had possessed the 
mate that other day. There might be anything hidden 
there — goods of all kinds for the easement of their 
present situation. There might even be treasure of 
gold and jewels. It was impossible to say what there 
might not be. And though gold and jewels were abso- 
lutely useless to them, placed as they were, and with 
no prospect, according to Macro, of rescue or relief, 
the possibility of such things lying hidden in untold 
quantity all about him stirred him strangely. 

He recognised feelings so abnormal to himself with 
no little surprise. He felt as a penniless small boy 
might feel if he were given the freedom of a great shop 
full of boxed-up toys and told to help himself. He 
wanted to smash open very closed case he came to, to 
see what was inside it. 

The water lapped and clunked dismally in the hol- 
lows below, and at times he had to climb almost down 
to it, and then up the further side, to get across faults 
in the pile. In one such black gully, on what was usually 
the leeward side of the pile, he had stepped cautiously 
from ledge to ledge, and laid hold of a projecting spar 
and was hauling himself up the other side, when he 
came face up against a dark little cranny between two 
great cases. And in the niche sat the skeleton of a man, 
all huddled up and jammed together, but grinning at 
him in so ferociously jovial a manner, as though he had 


108 


MAID OF THE MIST 


been expecting him and was rejoiced at the sight of 
him, that Wulfrey came near to losing his hold and 
falling into the water. He scrambled hastily past, and 
saw grinning faces in every dark corner for the rest 
of the day, and some of them were fact and some were 
only fancy. For the tumbled pile of wreckage was like 
a huge trap for the catching of anything the sweeping 
gales might bring it. 

He heard Macro’s voice, dulled by the mist, calling 
to him, and he answered but knew not which way to go 
to get to him. It was only by constant shouting and 
long and precarious scrambling that they came 
together again. 

‘We’d best keep close in this fog,” said the mate, “or 
one of us’ll be stopping the night here. Found any- 
thing 

“A dead man ” 

“Any of ours 

“No, he was only bones.” 

“It’s full of ’em. They’re no canny, but they’ll not 
harm us. Where’ll we begin 

“One place is as good as another. Here, I should 
say, and quietly, or those fiends of birds will be at us 
again.” 

“Bear a hand with this, then,” laying hold of a 
newly-stranded barrel. “That’s pork out of the ‘Grass- 
adoo,’ so it’ll be aH right,’ and heaving and hauling, 
they managed to g^t the barrel down on to the raft. 

As they poked about the pile in the mist, it was evi- 
dent they had struck a spot where a good portion of 
the contents of the ‘Grace-a-Dieu’ had lodged. Macro, 
having superintended the loading, recognised many of 
the marks and in some instances could recall their con- 
tents. 

“Women’s fallals,” he said, with a scornful crack at 
one large case. “If they’d been men’s, now, they’d have 
come in handy. . . . Boots and shoes, if I remember 


MAID OF THE MIST 


109 


rightly,” nodding at another case. “We’ll soon see,” 
and with a chunk of wood he stove in one side and 
hauled out a handful of its consents. — “Women’s troke 
again ! Mebbe we’ll find some men’s stuff in time. . . . 
I’ve seen yon chest before. . . . Old Will Taggart’s I 
think,” and he stove it open, and went down on his 
knees and raked over the contents. “Seaman’s slops, 
not much account. ... A new pipe and a tin of 
tobacco ! Thanks be ! We’ll take that . . . and 
another flint and steel. Always useful! . . . Clothes 
not much good, but we might be glad of ’em later on. 
. . . Yon’s a box of tea and it’ll be lead’lined inside. 
Should be more about. We had two hunderd aboard. 
. . . Glory I yon barrels are hard-tack. These ones are 
flour. If we work hard and get ’em ashore before the 
weather breaks again we’ll live in clover. . . . What’s 
this now.^ . . . ‘Duke of Kent’ ” — and he hauled up a 
stout wooden box by one handle out of a raffle of cord- 
age and ragged sail-cloth. “Name of a ship — or name 
of a man? That’s no a ship’s box.” 

A deft blow under the lock and the box lay open, 
displaying a number of uniforms, richly decorated with 
gold braid and lacing, all more or less damaged by 
water, but otherwise in good condition. 

“Duds enough to keep us going for a couple of years 
if so be as they fit,” said the mate exuberantly, and 
Wulfrey laughed out at the idea of their peacocking 
about their sandbank rigged out in court costumes. 

“He was Governor-General of Canada,” he said. “I 
remember hearing he lost his baggage on the ojurney.” 

“We’ll be Governor-Generals here when we’re needing 
a change. . . . Nothing but his clothes,” as he ran his 
hands all over the box. Mebbe we’ll find more of ’em 
lying about. Man ! what a place it is I It’d take a man 
a lifetime to work through all the stuff there is here.” 

They worked hard and carried home a huge load, 
but as there was no wind they had to paddle all the 


110 


MAID OF THE MIST 


way, and even Macro acknowledged to being a bit tired 
before they got all their plunder across the spit and 
on board, the transit across the lake on the smaller raft 
necessitating three separate journeys. He was in the 
highest of spirits, however, and keen to be back at the 
pile next day. As for Wulfrey, hardening though he 
was with all these unusual labours, he found himself 
almost too weary to eat. 

The fog lay on them like a white pall for six days. 
Macro predicted that it would go in a storm, and was 
urgent on salvaging all they could before it came. 

So, day after day, they went out to the pile, and came 
back loaded at night till they had stuff enough in their 
hold to keep them in comfort for many months to come. 

They had meat and drink, clothes and firing, and 
comfortable quarters. What more could any man want, 
unless it were to get away from it all.'^ And that, the 
mate asserted, time after time, was the unlikeliest thing 
that could happen. 

“We’re here till Kingdom come,” was the burden of 
his tune. “So we may as well be comfortable. And 
we’ve had the deil’s own luck. We might ha’ been living 
on rabbits and roots, and sleeping on the sand. Man! 
be thankful at being tired to such good purpose I” 

“I’m thankful enough and tired enough, and we’ve 
got stuff enough for a year. I’m going to take a rest.” 

“I’m for the pile again tomorrow. If you won’t come 
I’ll e’en make shift alone,” and Wulfrey let him go 
alone. 


XXII 

The smothering white fog lay thick on them for six 
days and then disappeared in the night. The morning 
broke dull and heavy, with a gusty wind from the south- 
west, and they could hear the waves breaking on the 


MAID OF THE MIST 


111 


spit with a sound like the low growl of a menacing 
beast. 

“I’m off to the pile,” said the mate. 

“Better take a day off. You’ve been working too 
hard.” 

“Not me. I cannot sit here while all yon stuff’s cry- 
ing aloud to be picked up.” 

“Well, I’ll be on the look-out, and come across to 
give you a hand from the spit when you get there.” 

“I’ll lash you up a bit float that’ll bring you over, 
before I go. And you’ll mebbe have some food ready 
against I get back. It’s, hungry work out there.” 

“I’U be ready for you. If you load up too heavily 
you’ll not get back at all.” 

“I’ll see to that. Wind’s fair, it’ll bring me home 
all right.” 

So Wulfrey had the day to himself, and had time, 
which the labours of the previous days had not per- 
mitted him, to consider the situation in all its aspects. 

So far they had been marvellously favoured, without 
doubt. Ten days ago they were swinging up and down 
onon the galley-roof inside the cage of the dead ship’s 
ribs, possessed of nothing but their bare lives, and those 
but doubtfully. And here they were, provided for in 
every respect, with comforts which shipwrecked men had 
no right to expect, and with unlimited further stores to 
draw upon. They could live without fear. . . . 

But what a life, after all. Eating, drinking, sleeping, 
— raking over the wreckage for possible plunder that 
was useless to them', — rambling among the. rabbits and 
the sandhills. Quarrelling in time, maybe. Perhaps it 
was a good thing there was a ship for each of them. 

He was not himself of a quarrelsome disposition. The 
mate, he thought, might be difficult to put up with if 
he took a crooked turn. But it would be the height of 
folly for two men, bound together by ill-fortune, and 
to this bare bank for aU time, to fall out. Every cir- 


112 


MAID OF THE MIST 


cumspection within his power he resolved to exercise, 
and so far, indeed, his companion had given him no 
cause to mistrust or doubt him. 

But he had a somewhat discomforting feeling that he 
knew very little of the real man that lay beneath that 
saturnine exterior, that there might be elemental depths 
there which would surprise him if they came to be 
revealed. This Macro that he knew was to him some- 
thing in the nature of a sleeping volcano, outwardly 
quiet but full of hidden fires. 

He could imagine no likely grounds for dispute be- 
tween them. Each worked for the common good, and 
so far they had shared all things equally and without 
question. But how would it be as the weeks dragged 
into months, and the months into years 

So far the rifling of the wreckage had afforded the 
mate all the outlet he needed for his activities. In min- 
istering to the cravings of the riever spirit that was 
strong in him it had also supplied their wants in over- 
whelming abundance. The longer it kept him busy the 
better, and if it yielded him plunder of value he was 
entirely welcome to it. 

Wulfrey could not imagine his discovering anything 
out there which could by any possibility lead to any 
serious difference between them. And yet, in spite of 
all that, from little glimpses he had caught at times of 
the strange wild, hidden nature of the man, he was not 
without doubts as to his absolute congeniality as a sole 
companion for the rest of his days. 

In short he had a vague feeling that, if by any chance 
they came to loggerheads. Macro might prove an ex- 
tremely unpleasant person to be shut up with, within 
bounds so limited as this great bank of sand. 

He recognised such feelings, however, as unneces- 
sarily morbid, and ascribed them to the general murki- 
ness of the outlook and over-weariness from the exer- 
tions of the last few days. So he tumbled overboard 


MAID OF THE MIST 


113 


on to the new raft and paddled to the nearer shore, and 
set off for a brisk walk over the sandhills and along the 
beach, in search of a more hopeful frame of mind. 

Why could they not build a boat? Macro said the 
coast of Nova Scotia was but a hundred miles or so 
away. A hundred miles was no great affair, and there 
was wood among that pile enough to build a thousand 
boats. So far, indeed, they had not come upon any 
tools except the rusty axe, for tool-chests probably 
sank at once on the outer banks where the ships went 
to pieces. 

Still, he would suggest it to Macro. It might prove 
a further outlet for his energies. If he should by chance 
find plunder of value out there he might, when he was 
satiated, favour the idea of an attempt to escape. In 
fact, plunder without any attempt to utilise it would be 
absurd. 

The opportunity of making his own position clear, 
and thereby obviating any cause for dispute, occurred 
that same day. 

When, in the afternoon, he saw the mate coming 
slowly along before the wind, he paddled over to the 
spit to meet him and found him in great spirits. 

“Man ! it’s been a great day, and if ye’d been there 
ye’d have had your chance. I lit on some graand things. 
Wait while I show you ” 

“Let’s get ’em all aboard first. They’ll keep, and I’ll 
be bound you’re tired and hungry.” 

“Hungert as a wolf, but finding siccan things takes 
the tired out o’ one,” and his black eyes sparkled over 
his finds, and he must go on telling about them as they 
worked. 

“It was down under where we found yon Duke o’ Kent 
box. I spied another, and then more, mebbe there’s 
more yet down below.” 

“More fancy coats?” 

“Ah! — and some with jewelled stars on ’em and 


114 MAID OF THE MIST 

swords with fancy liilts. ITl show you when we get 
aboard.” 

“You didn’t come across any tools, I suppose.?” 

“Tools.? No. What would we want tools for.?” 

“I was wondering if it might not be possible to build 
some kind of a boat and get across to Nova Scotia.” 

“We’re safer here than trying that, I’m thinking.” 

“When you’ve got all there is to be got out there 
you’ll want to get home and enjoy it ” 

“Man! It’d take a hunderd years to go through it 
all. It’s bin piling up there since ever this bank silted 
up.” 

“Oh well, we don’t want to stop here a hundred years, 
that’s certain. What’s the good of it all if you can’t 
make any use of it.?” 

“It’s graand to handle anyway.” 

And when they had eaten, he opened some of his bun- 
dles and displayed his treasures, — a jewelled ‘George,’ 
roughly cut from some Garter-knight’s court-coat, sev- 
eral smaller decorations, all more or less ornamented 
with precious stones, three dress-swords with mountings 
in ivory and gold, a small wooden box lined with sodden 
blue velvet in which were half a dozen rings, some of 
which, from the size of the stones and the massiveness of 
their setting, seemed to Wulfrey of considerable value. 

“They’re worth something, all those,” said Macro, as 
he handled them with loving exultation. 

“Ay, if you could get them home and turn them into 
money. I don’t see what use they’re going to be to you 
here,” said Wulfrey, fiddling his own string again. 

“They’re fine to have anyway.” 

“I’d sooner have another pipe and some more to- 
bacco than the whole of them.” 

“Ye can have that too,” and he rooted in another 
bundle and produced both. “They’re oot a dead man’s 
chest and they’re wet. But he’s no use for ’em and 


MAID OF THE MIST 


115 


they’ll dry. So there ye are. Ye dinnot care for jew- 
els.^” and he looked at Wulfrey wonderingly. 

“As to that, I don’t say I wouldn’t pick them up if I 
came across them, but I’ve no hankering for them.” 

“Ye’ve plenty money of your own, mebbe.” 

“As much as I need — if ever I get ashore.” 

“Ah ! It meks a difference, ye see. I never had any 
to speak of, and these bonny sparklers pluck at the 
heart o’ me.” 

“You’re welcome to all you can get, as far as I’m 
concerned ” 

“Ay, man, they’re mine, for I found ’em.” 

“But they’re no use to you unless we can get away 
from here. Get ashore and you can turn them to ac- 
count. Now why couldn’t we build some kind of a boat 
and get across to Nova Scotia There’s wood enough 
and to spare out yonder ” 

“Ay, there’s wood, but ef we had the tools ’twould 
still be no easy matter. An’ then ye’ve got to reckon 
wi’ the weather. ’Twould be a bad move to spend our 
time building a boat only to go to the bottom in her 
with all the gear we’d gathered. We’re safe here, any- 
way. Mebbe some day a boat’ll come ashore not so 
broke but we can patch her up. . . . How’d ye like to 
be afloat in a home-made boat a night like thisi^” 

For while they sat, eating and talking, the day had 
darkened, and now and again there came a menacing 
whuffle down the open hatch, and the little ship was 
filled with a tremulous humming as the rising wind 
played on their bare masts, and the growl of the spit 
had deepened into a Jong hoarse roar. 

“It’ll be a bitter bad night I’m thinking. I saw it 
coming away out yonder. Mebbe it’ll add some to our 
pile of stuff. Mebbe it’ll bring us a boat.” 

“We will not hope for either,” said Wulfrey soberly, 
“for that means more deaths out yonder ” 

A long shrill scream outside sent a creepy chill down 


116 


MAID OF THE MIST 


his spine for a moment. He glanced apprehensively 
across at Macro in the flickering light of the Are, and 
saw his face livid, his eyes like great black wells, his 
jaw dropped. 

“The spirits o’ the dead !” jerked the mate. “There’s 
a hantle o’ them out there. . . . They’re mebbe after 
me for these things. . . .” and he rocked himself to and 
fro, where he sat on the floor, and muttered strange 
words, — “An ainm au Athar, ’s an Mhic, ’s an Spioraid 
Naoimh,” — in the name of the Father, and of the Son, 
and of the Holy Ghost. 

The weird shrieking waxed louder and shriller. Wul- 
frey got up and climbed the steps, and found the 
stormy twilight gray with that vast cloud of birds, all 
fleeing blindly before the gale and each one screaming 
its loudest. 

It was a fearsome, blood-curdling clamour, an ear- 
splitting pandemonium, a whirling Sabbat, as if all the 
demons of the pit had broken loose and clothed them- 
selves in wings and shrieks and deadly fear. 

“It’s only those damnable birds,” he bent and shouted 
gruffly down to Macro, vexed with himself at his own 
momentary fright. 

But the mate was not for accepting any such simple 
explanation as that. 

“Man !” he said hoarsely. “Birds ye may think ’em, 
but I know better. It is spirits they are, — spirits of all 
the dead that ever died in this dread place, — a great 
multitude — their bones are white out there, but the 
spirits of them cannot rest. A Mhoire ghradhach! 
’Twas under the Dark Star we were born, and here we’ll 
die and leave our bones to whiten in the sand, and the 
spirits of us will go screeching and scrauchling wi’ the 
rest. Come away, man, and shut the doors tight or 
they’ll be in on us !” 

Wulfrey had never seen anything like it. Those 
myriads of fluttering whjgs looked as though the whole 


MAID OF THE MIST 


117 


gray sky had come tumbling down in fragments. It 
was like a snowstorm on a gigantic scale, every whirling 
flake a bundle of wildly screaming feathers. 

He stood watching for a time and listening to the 
growing thunder of the rollers on the spit. He im- 
agined their crashing in white foam-fury among the 
stark ribs of the dead ships out there on the banks. 

He shivered as he recalled the chill horrors of their 
own undoing and deliverance. It was wonderful beyond 
words, with that in his mind, to be standing there, safe 
and warm, and well provided, and his heart was full of 
gratitude. 

“God help any who are out there this night !” he said 
to himself, and closed the doors on the storm-fiends, and 
squatted on the floor over against the mate, who sat 
rocking slowly to and fro in great discomfort and mut- 
tered Gaelic seuns as a protection against the unholy 
things that wandered outside. 

All night long their little ship was filled with the hum 
of the shuddering masts, broken now and again with the 
creaking and jerking of their rusty cable. And when- 
ever Wulfrey, warm in his bunk with many blankets, 
woke up for a moment, he heard the deep thunder of the- 
waves on the spit, and the howl of the wind outside, and 
the thrashing of the rain on deck ; and he thanked God 
for warmth and shelter, and lay listening for a moment, 
and then rolled over and went to sleep again. 

The storm lasted three full days, during which they 
never once left the ship. They had all they needed, and 
fresh water was obtainable in any quantity by slinging 
an empty keg outside one of the scupper-holes through 
which the rain drained off the deck. 

Macro’s gloomy humour lasted, off and on, as long as 
the storm. The birds had mostly hidden themselves in 
sheltered nooks among the sandhills. But every now 
and again the evil in them, or maybe it was hunger, 
would stir them up and set them whirling and shrieking 


118 


MAID OF THE MIST 


round the ship, and sometimes lighting on it in pro- 
digious numbers, and the mate would curse them long 
and deep and fall once more to his spells and invoca- 
tions. The fury of the storm did not trouble him, but 
the screaming of the birds seemed to touch the super- 
stitious spot in his nature and set all his nerves jang- 

ling- 

It was during one of the lull times that he astonished 
Wulfrej by hauling out his rolls of silks and velvets, 
and with an elemental, almost barbaric, delight in their 
rich colourings, he cut them into long strips, which he 
fixed neatly to the walls of the cabin by means of 
wooden pegs. The gorgeous results afforded him the 
greatest satisfaction, which nothing but the wailing of 
the birds could damp. Whenever their shrill clamour 
broke out the darkness fell on him again. He hurled 
uncouth curses at them and no arguments availed 
against his humour. 

To Wulfrey, on the other hand, the birds and their 
dismal shriekings , were but an incident, the fury of the 
storm a wonder and a revelation. 

All through that former time of stress, which had 
ended in their undoing, his powers of observation and 
appreciation had been dulled by his fears of disaster. 
Then, the howl of the gale and the onslaught of the 
seas had been like hungry deaths close at his heels. But 
here, in the perfect security of the land-locked lake, he 
was free to watch and to wonder. 

At times, indeed, it seemed to him that the terrible 
force of the wind might lift them bodily, ship and all, 
and hurl them into the turmoil beyond. Then he re- 
membered that many such storms must have swept the 
island and still the ships were there. 

The waves that broke on the spit seemed to him 
higher than tall houses, and the weight of them, as they 
curled and crashed on the sand, made the whole island 
tremble, he was certain. The uproar was deafening. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


119 


and at times great lashes of white spray came hurtling 
over into the lake, and scourging it into sizable waves 
of its own. 

When Wulfrey woke on the fourth morning he was 
conscious of a change, and running up on deck he found 
the sun shining in a pale-blue, storm-washed sky, and 
nothing left of the gale but the great green waves 
breaking sullenly on the beach beyond the spit. 

He stripped and plunged overboard, and climbed up 
again full of the joy of life and physical fitness. 

XXIII 

The days crept into weeks, the weeks into months, with 
nothing to break the monotony of their life but visits to 
the wreckage, an occasional skirmish with the birds, 
rabbit-hunts, rude attempts at fishing, which met with 
so little success from lack of anything approaching 
proper material that they gave it up in disgust, and 
rambles among the sandhills. 

They got along companionably enough; the mate’s 
only complaint, — and that not untinged with satisfac- 
tion, and obviously prompted more by a desire for his 
help than from any wish to halve his spoils — that Wul- 
frey showed so poor a spirit in the matter of plunder, 
and so shamefully neglected the opportunities of a life- 
time. 

For himself, if he could have found safe lodging out 
there, he would have lived on the wreck-pile, to save the 
time and trouble of going to and fro. The riever spirit 
of his forefathers was kept at boiling-point by the pos- 
sibilities of fortune which lurked there. The search in 
itself at once satisfied and stimulated the natural crav- 
ing for booty which rioted in his Highland-Spanish 
blood, £lnd he never tired of it. 

He came back laden every time with things for the 


120 


MAID OF THE MIST 


common good, and rarer pickings for his private hoard, 
over which he exulted like a chieftain returned from a 
successful foray. 

Wulfrey was on the whole not ungrateful to the pile 
for affording him such distraction. He discussed the 
latest additions to his treasure-trove with him, as they 
sat by the fire of a night, and speculated with him on 
their probable origin and value, and the higher he 
assessed this the more the mate’s black eyes glowed. 

He would sit watching Wulfrey as he turned the 
latest find over and over, and weighed it in his hand, 
and polished a bit of it to get at its basic metal, and 
mused on its shape and endeavoured to arrive at its 
history. And at such times there was in the sombre 
black eyes something of the look of an uncertain-tem- 
pered dog whose lawful bone is in jeopardy. 

Once or twice, Wulfrey, glancing up as he passed an 
opinion, caught that curious suspicious look bent on 
him, and was amused and annoyed at it, and also some- 
what discomfited. Did the man think he coveted his use- 
less little gauds? — useless in their present extremity, 
though some of them doubtless valuable enough if they 
could be sold. Why, he esteemed a dryable twist of to- 
bacco infinitely more highly than any silver candlestick 
or shapely silver cup that the other could fish up from 
the depths. It seemed to him just as well that the 
plunder-fever had attacked only one of them, for he 
doubted if his companion would willingly have shared 
with another. For the fever grew with his finds. 

Once they came within an ace of a quarrel, and 
though it blew over, the seeds remained. 

Where the mate hid his spoil, Wulfrey neither knew 
nor cared nor ever troubled his head about. He would 
no more have occupied his thoughts with it than he 
would have taken more than his proper share of the 
food or tobacco. 

But increase breeds suspicion, and suspicion clouds 


MAID OF THE MIST 


121 


the outlook. Among other things, Macro one day 
brought home a small crucifix and some strings of 
beads, which he believed to be of gold, while Wulfrey, 
from their hardness to the touch of the knife, pro- 
nounced them only brass. They were all curiously 
carved or cast, however, and, whatever the metal of 
which they were made, he expressed his admiration of 
the workmanship. 

A night or two later, to his amazement. Macro came 
out of his own cabin more black-a-vised than he had 
ever seen him, and asked abruptly, “Where’s that 
cross 

“What cross.?” 

“You know what cross. Yon gold cross I showed 
you two nights ago. Where is it.?” and he lowered at 
Wulfrey like a full-charged thunder-cloud. 

“I know nothing of your cross, man. I suppose you 
put it with the rest of your things.” 

“I did that, and it’s gone. Where is it.?” 

“Don’t speak to me like that. Macro. I won’t have 
it. I know nothing about your cross or any of your 
plunder. I’ve told you before, it is nothing to me. If 
I wanted it I’d go and get it for myself.” 

“It was there with the rest and it’s no there now. 
And ” 

“ !” cried Wulfrey, springing up 

ablaze with indignation. “Do you dare to think I would 
touch your dirty pilferings .?” and it looked as though 
the next instant would find them at grips. 

But the mate had broken out in the sudden discovery 
of his loss. Wulf stood full as tall as himself. He 
looked very fit and capable, and looked, moreover, as 
the mate’s common sense told him, as soon as it got the 
chance, the last person in the world to tamper with an- 
other man’s goods — even though he might be the only 
one circumstantially able to have done so. 


122 


MAID OF THE MIST 


‘Tt’s gone anyway,” he growled. “But it’s no good 
fighting about it.” 

“That’s not enough. Your greed for gain has blinded 
you. Till you come to your senses I’ve nothing more to 
do with you,” and for two days not a word passed be- 
tween them. 

Each prepared his own food as and when he chose, 
and ate it apart from the other. The mate hung about 
as though loth to leave Wulfrey in sole charge at home, 
and the atmosphere of the little cabin was murky and 
charged with lightning. 

On the third day Wulfrey ostentatiously set off for 
the wreck-pile by himself. He was running out of to- 
bacco and would not have acceped any from the mate 
if it had been offered. 

He waded out, made a rough raft on Macro’s lines, 
and smashed open such seamen’s chests as he could 
discover, for it was always in them that they found 
tobacco. 

He got several small lots, and a couple of new pipes, 
and a flint and steel, charged his raft with a keg of rum 
and a case of hard-tack, and managed to get it all back 
to the spit and to the ship single-handed. 

As he came up the side, the mate met him, with the 
missing crucifix in his hand. 

“The little deevil of a thing,” he said, with quite un- 
conscious incongruity, “had slipped down a crack, back 
o’ the locker, and I were wrong to think ye could have 
taken it.” 

“Well, don’t play the fool again,” said Wulfrey 
shortly. “If your greed for other folk’s goods hadn’t 
blinded you, you would understand that a gentleman 
does not stoop to stealing.” 

“I’ve seen some I wouldn’t trust further’n I could see 
’em, and then only if their hands were up over their 
heads. But ye’re not that kind, an’ I was wrong. So 


MAID OF THE MIST 


123 


there ’tis, an’ no more to be said. What have ye 
found 

“Pipes and tobacco. That is all I went for.” 

After his two days of enforced silence Macro was in- 
clined to expand, but found his advances coldly re- 
ceived. Wulfrey’s pride was in arms and the insult 
rankled. 

By degrees, however, the storm-cloud drifted by, and 
matters between them became again much as they had 
been, with somewhat of added knowledge, on each side, 
of the character of the other. 

The mate had learned that the Doctor, quiet as he 
might appear, was not a man to suffer injustice or to 
be meddled with. And Wulfrey had got a further warn- 
ing of the possibilities of trouble should he and the 
mate come to serious differences. 

It seemed absurd that two men, stranded, perhaps 
for life, on this bare sandbank, should be unable to live 
together in amity. Yet, his experience of men told him 
that it was just such enforced close intimacy — the con- 
stant rubbing together of very divergent natures, with 
nothing in common between them but the necessities en- 
tailed by their common misfortune — that might, nay 
almost certainly must, come to explosion at times, un- 
less they both set themselves sedulouslj^ to the keeping 
of the peace. 

If any actual rupture took place between them, he 
foresaw that the mate might develop phases of charac- 
ter which would be exceedingly awkward and difficult to 
deal with. Freedom from all the ordinary restraints 
which civilisation imposed upon the natural inner man 
might easily run to wildest licence. 

At bottom this man was just a wild Highland 
cateran with a dash of Spanish buccaneer, hot-blooded, 
avid of gain under circumstances so propitious, insa- 
tiable. The chance of a lifetime had come to him and 
he was exultantly set on making the most of it. He 


124 


MAID OF THE MIST 


was like a cage-bred wolf set down suddenly into the 
midst of an unprotected flock of sheep. There was his 
natural prey in profusion and there was none to stay 
him. To be dropped unexpectedly on to this enormous 
pile of plunder was like the realisation of a fairy tale. 
No wonder he was inchned to lose his head. 

It was fortunate, thought Wulfrey, that they were 
built on different lines, and that the plunder-pile made 
absolutely no appeal to himself beyond the necessaries 
of life. 

He determined, as far as in him lay, to walk warily 
and to avoid, as far as possible, any just cause of 
offence on his side. 


BOOKflll 


BONE OF CONTENTION 


XXIV 

They had been three months on the island, and in all 
that time had never sighted a living ship, though the 
remains of newly-dead ones were never wanting after 
bad weather. 

It was evident that the men of the sea avoided Sable 
Island as if it were a pestilence, and came there only 
when it no longer mattered to them whether they came 
there or not. 

Macro was, by degrees and with never-lessening en- 
joyment, amassing a very considerable treasure. If 
ever the chance of getting back to land arrived, and he 
could get his plunder home, he would have no need to 
follow the sea for the rest of his life. But, whether or 
not that crowning good fortune should ever be his, this 
gathering of spoil was a huge satisfaction to the very 
soul of him, and he desired no better. 

The only flies in his big honey-pot were those rival 
depredators the birds. He had many a battle royal 
with them, and came home at times scratched and 
clawed and furiously comminative, consigning birds of 
all shapes and sizes to everlasting perdition. Spirits or 
no spirits, in the day time, and in the prosecution of 
his work, he would flght them valiantly or trick them 
cleverly.^ 

But in the black storms that swept over them at 
times, when the great waves crashed like thunder on the 
spit, and the sandhills and hummocks melted away un- 
125 


126 


MAID OF THE MIST 


der Wulfrey’s wondering eyes and built themselves 
afresh in new places, when the shrieking hosts came 
whirling round the ship and the sky was full of their 
raucous clamour, then the darkness came on Macro and 
he fell again to his seuns, and knew them, beyond all 
doubt, for things of evil. 

When the odds out there on the wreck-pile were too 
much for him he learned by experience how to fool 
them. He would smash furiously at them with his club, 
shouting in wild exultation as the bashed bodies went 
tumbling into the sea. If that did not discourage them, 
and their venom persisted, he would drop quietly into 
some adajcent hole amid the wreckage where they could 
not get at him, and wait there till they whirled away 
after easier prey. 

So keen was he on adding to his store that, when their 
commissariat needed replenishing, Wulfrey found it 
necessary to accompany him and to insist on his at- 
tending strictly to this more important business, or at 
times they would have gone short. For the rest, Wul- 
frey left him to the satisfaction of his cravings and in- 
terfered with him not at all. 

One memorable morning, which broke sweet and clear 
after two days of stress and storm, the mate set off as 
usual to find what the gods had sent him; and Wulf, 
leaning over the side, watched him paddle across to 
the spit, and land there, and stride away towards the 
western point from which they always waded out to the 
wreckage. 

But on this occasion, before he disappeared in the 
distance, he stopped and stood looking out over the sea, 
and the next moment Wulfrey saw him wading out to- 
wards something which only caught his eye when thus 
directed to it, — something which bobbed up and down 
among the waves with a glint of white at times. 

He saw Macro reach it and lift his arms in a gesture 
of amazement. Then he bent over it and presently 


MAID OF THE MIST 


127 


came staggering back up the shore bearing a white 
burden over his shoulder. It looked at that distance so 
very like a body that Wulfrey tumbled over on to his 
raft, and paddled across to the spit, and ran along the 
shore to where the mate was kneeling now alongside his 
find. 

It was the body of a woman, pallid and Sodden, with 
her long dark hair all astrearn, her white face pinched 
and shrunken and blue-veined, with dark hollows round 
the closed eyes, and colourless lips slightly retracted 
showing even, white teeth. She was clothed only in a 
long white nightdress, which the water had so moulded 
to her shapely figure that it looked like a piece of fair 
white marble sculpture. In life she must have been 
beautiful, Wulfrey thought, as he stood panting, and 
gazed down upon her. 

“Dead.?” he jerked. 

“Ay, sure! She were lashed to yonder spar and I 
couldna leave her there. . . . The pity of it! She’s 
been a fine bit.” 

Wulfrey knelt down, and slipped his hand to the 
quiet heart, instinctively but without hope, bent closer, 
gently raised one of the closed eyelids, and said hastily, 
“There may be a chance. Help me back home with 
her! Quick! You take her feet. . . .” and he taking 
her under the arms they hurried back along the spit. 

“She is not dead from drowning anyway,” he jerked 
as they went. “The exposure may have killed her. . . . 
She must have suffered dreadfully.” 

It was no easy task to get on board, but they man- 
aged it somehow, and laid her gently among the 
blankets in Wulfrey’s bunk. 

“Now. . . . Bags of hot sand, as quick as you can 
and as many. . . . Then mix some hot rum and water 
— not too strong,” — and Macro found himself spring- 
ing to his orders with an alacrity which would have sur- 
prised him if he had had time to think about it. 


128 


MAID OF THE MIST 


Wulfrey, his professional instincts at highest pres- 
sure, drew off the clinging garment, muffled the sea-bit- 
ten white body in the blankets, and through them set to 
gentle vigorous rubbing, to start the chilled blood flow- 
ing again. 

Macro came hurrying in with hot sand from the 
hearth, wrapped in linen and tied with strands of un- 
twisted rope. 

“Good! ... As many more as you can,” said the 
Doctor, and placed them against the cold, blue-white 
feet, and rubbed away for dear life. 

By degrees he packed her all round with hot sand- 
bags, Macro heating them as fast as they cooled, in a 
frying-pan over the fire. He placed them under her 
arms and between her shoulders, and never ceased his 
vigorous friction except to renew the bags. 

Each time the mate came in, his face asked news, and 
each time Wulfrey shook his head and said, “Not yet,” 
and went on with his rubbing. His own blood was at 
fever-heat with his exertions in that confined space. 
But that was all the better. His superfluous warmth 
might transmit itself in time to the chill white body of 
his patient. 

Macro came in with hot rum and water, and Wulfrey 
poured a few careful drops between the still-livid lips, 
watched the result anxiously, and followed them up with 
more, and then resumed his patient rubbing. 

For over an hour they worked incessantly, and then 
Macro was for giving it up as hopeless. 

“ ’S no good. She’s gone, sure,” he said. 

“I don’t think so. . . . Too soon to give up any- 
way,” and the Doctor worked on tirelessly. “If she 
should come round ” 

“She won’t.” 

“ — She’ll be starving. You might break up some 
hard-tack very small and warm it up in some weak rum 
and water,” and he went on with his rubbing. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


129 


And at last, when he had almost given up hope him- 
self, he had his reward. The mate, poking in a head 
deprecatory of further waste of time and energy on so 
hopeless a job, stood staring amazedly. For the 
pinched dead look of the pitiful white face had given 
place to a faint presage of life, like the first flutter of 
dawn on the pallid darkness of the night. Death had 
visibly relaxed his chill grip. There was a tinge of 
colour in the parted lips, and the white teeth inside had 
come together. 

“She lives,” said Wulfrey softly. “Her heart is at 
work again. Warm up that rum and water,” and when 
it came he administered it cautiously in drops again, 
and this time they were visibly swallowed. 

“Have the warm mash ready,” he said; and even as 
he spoke the blue-veined lids fluttered, but so feebly as 
hardly to lift the long dark lashes from the white 
cheeks. And through that narrowed window the recov- 
ered soul looked mistily out on life once more. 

He gave her still a little more hot rum and water, 
and when the warm mashed biscuit came fed her slowly 
with that, and she swallowed it hungrily if uncon- 
sciously. 

Then, well satisfied with his work, he piled more 
blankets on her and left her to herself. 

He had had many a fight with death, but none closer 
than this. The snatching of a life from the cold hand 
that was closing on it was always a cause for rejoicing 
with him. And this life, by reason of its comely tene- 
ment, had appealed to him in quite an unusual way. 

Who she was, and what manner of woman, was still 
to be learned. For the moment it was enough that she 
had been within an ace of death and was alive again, 
and that she was unusually good to look upon. 


130 


MAID OF THE MIST 


XXV 

When the Dhctor had had a plunge overboard to re- 
store the vitality he had expended on his patient, they 
sat down to eat, and the mate was inclined to enlarge 
somewhat exuberantly on the morning’s work, — upon 
his own share in it especially. 

“A wonderful fine piece of goods for any man to drag 
out of the water. I’m doubting if you’d have seen her if 
you’d bin there. Doctor. Just happened to lift my eye 
that way, and the white of her caught it, and in I went. 
Not that I thought she could be living, you understand. 
She felt like Death itself when I carried her ashore in 
my arms ” 

“She’ll be distressed for lack of clothes when she’s 
ready to get up. But that won’t be to-day anyway. 
Do you think you can light on any out yonder.?” 

“Lit on some last time I was there, but left ’em ’cause 
they were no use to us. That lot’ll mebbe be gone, but 
there’s plenty more for the finding. I’ll see to it to- 
morrow.” 

“She will be grateful to you, I’m sure.” 

“She should, for if it hadn’t bin for me she’d be tum- 
bling about on yon spar still, and dead by this time, I’m 
thinking.” 

“She couldn’t have stood much more, that’s certain. 
I was near losing hope myself at times.” 

“Wouldn’t have believed she’d ever come back if I 
hadn’t seen it. It’s being a doctor made ye keep on so.” 

“One feels bound to keep on while there’s a possible 
chance left. In this case one couldn’t but feel that there 
was a chance, if only a small one. We’ve done a good 
day’s work to-day.” 

“Ay,” said the mate, and presently, “I’m thinking 
I’ll go out there today to get her some clothes. They’ll 
need a lot of drying, you see.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


131 


“Can you do it before dark?” 

“I’ll do it. Ye’ll see to her.” 

“I’ll see to her all right. A little more food and then 
the longer she sleeps the better. If she’d lie where she 
is for a couple of days it would be all to the good.” 

“Then I’ll go,” but he came back to bend down into 
the little companion-way and say, “If she’s asking, ye’ll 
tell her it was me pulled her out the water.” 

“I’ll tell her.” 

When, presently, Wulfrey went to see how she was 
going on, he found her sleeping quietly the sleep of ut- 
ter exhaustion, and as he stood looking at her it 
seemed to him that she grew more beautiful each time 
he saw her. 

The long wet tresses, whose clamminess he had care- 
fully disposed behind the rolled-up blankets which 
served as a pillow, were drying to a deep warm brown. 
As they carried her in he had thought her hair was 
black. It was very thick and long. The texture of her 
skin, now that the coursing blood had obliterated to 
some extent the pinch and the bite of the sea, was fine 
and delicate, he could see, though suffering still from 
the salt. 

The pink fingers of one hand had pulled down the 
blankets round her neck as though she had craved more 
air, and the soft white neck was smooth and white as 
marble. The one ear turned towards him was like a 
delicate little pink shell. 

All these things he noted before his gaze settled on 
the quiet sleeping face, and lingered there with a 
strange new sense of joyous discovery and unexpected 
increase, as one might feel who suddenly unearths a 
hidden treasure. 

He wondered again who she was and whence she 
came. Of gentle birth, he was sure. It showed in 
every feature of the placid face, — in the strong sweet 
curves of a not too small mouth, — in the delicately- 


132 


MAID OF THE MIST 


turned nostrils, — in the soft level brows, — in the long 
fringing lashes which, with the shadows left by her 
sharp encounter with Death, cast about her closed eyes 
a misty enchantment full of witchery and allurement. 
He wondered what colour her eyes would be when they 
opened. 

A wide white forehead, somewhat high cheek-bones, 
and a round well-moulded chin, added a fine dignity to 
the sleeping face. He stood so long gazing at its all- 
unconscious fascination that he feared at last lest the 
very earnestness of his look might disturb her. 

So he picked up her only earthly possession, and 
leaving her, sleeping soundly, in sole charge of the ship, 
paddled across to the nearer shore, washed the salt out 
of her dainty single garment in a fresh-water pool, and 
spread it in the sun to dry, and then went after rabbits 
for her benefit when she should waken ravenous. 

Returned on board, after a glance at his still-sleeping 
patient, — who lay so motionless that, but for the slight, 
slow rise and fall of the blankets over her bosom, one 
might have deemed her dead, — he set to the making of 
as tempting a soup as rabbit and rice could furnish, 
and regretted, more sorely than ever before, his lack of 
salt and seasoning. 

Then he sat waiting for her to awake and for Macro 
to come home. If she did not wake of her own accord 
before sunset he decided to wake her himself. Sleep was 
without doubt the best of all restoratives, but Nature 
craves sustenance, and she was almost certainly starv- 
ing. She would recover strength more quickly still if 
her system had something to draw upon. 

Then, too, they had no light but that of the fire. If 
she woke up in the dark she would be sorely exercised 
in her mind to know where she had got to. It would be 
better to satisfy her, mentally and bodily, while still 
there was daylight to see by. 

So, when the sun shone level through the western 


MAID OF THE MIST 


133 


portholes, he went softly to where she lay, still sleep- 
ing soundly, and, after watching her again for a mo- 
ment, he placed his hand gently on her forehead. 

She frowned at the touch and moved uneasily among 
her blankets. Then the heavy eyes opened and she lay 
staring wonderingly up at him, evidently trying to 
piece past and present together, and to make out where 
she was. 

‘‘Where am 1.^^ . . . Who are you.^” she jerked, in a 
voice that would have been rich and full if it had not 
been a little hoarse and husky. And the pink fingers 
grasped the blanket and drew it up under the rounded 
white chin. 

“You are quite safe on a ship. I am a doctor. I 
want you to eat some warm soup and then you shall 
sleep again as long as you can. Here is your night- 
rail, washed and dried; perhaps you would like to put 
it on. I will go and fetch the soup.” 

When he came back presently she was visibly more at 
ease with her frills about her neck. She raised herself 
on her left elbow, and he placed the tin pannikin of 
soup in front of her, together with some broken biscuit. 

“Can you feed yourself.?’” he asked. 

“Oh, yes — if I had a spoon.” 

“I am sorry to say we have no spoons.” 

“No spoons.?”’ and she stared at him in vast surprise. 

“Perhaps you can make shift to drink it out of the 
pannikin. You see ” 

“What a very odd ship — to have no spoons!” she 
took a sip of the soup and screwed up her lips. “Would 
you get me some salt, if you please.?’ This soup ” 

“I’m sorry, but we have no salt either. You see ” 

“No salt.?”’ and she shot another quick amazed look 
at him. “Mon Dieu, mon Dieu!” at which Wulfrey 
pricked up his ears. “Whatever kind of a ship — you 
did say a ship, did you not.?’ Where is it going to.?”’ 


134 


MAID OF THE MIST 


“It’s not going anywhere. You see, it’s practically a 
stranded ship though it’s really afloat ” 

She put her hand to her forehead and rubbed it 
gently, and then clasped it tightly, with her thumb at 
one temple and her fingers at the other. “I think my 
head is swimming yet,” she said simply. “I cannot fol- 
low what you say.” 

“You’ll understand as soon as you get on deck. This 
ship is bottled up inside a lake on an island. It has 
been here for probably thirty or forty years ” 

“And you — have you been here all that time.?” 

“No, we were wrecked as you were, I suppose, on the 
banks out there. We managed to get ashore and found 
this ship to live on.” 

“Who are %e’.?” 

“The mate of the ship and myself. We were the only 
ones saved. It was he saw you in the water and went 
in after you and brought you ashore.” 

“It was good of him. I will thank him. Where is 
he.?” 

“He’s out at the wreckage trying to find you some 
clothes.” 

“He is a good man. . . . How long have you been 
here .?” 

“About three months.” 

“And no one has come to you in all that time .?” 

“You are the first. Now” — as she finished the soup 
— “take a good drink of this,” — some weak rum and 
water warmed up in another pannikin, over which she 
choked and coughed and wrinkled up her pretty nose 
distastefully. “Then you will go to sleep again, and 
in the morning I hope you will be all right.” 

“But there is so much I would like to know ” 

“When you have had another long sleep. Are you 
quite warm.?” 

“Quite. That horrid stuff was like fire,” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


135 


“You were cold enough when we found you. In fact 
we believed you were dead.” 

She shivered and nestled down among the blankets 
with a wave of colour in her face. 

“I will sleep,” she said quietly, and the Doctor left 
her to herself. 

XXVI 

It was almost dark before the mate pitched his cargo 
up on to the deck and came groping up the side after it. 

“What luck.?” asked Wulfrey, as he came up to help 
him. 

“Brought all I could lay hands on, but I wouldn’t 
like to say they’re right kind of things.” 

“She’ll be glad of them whatever they are.” 

“Has she come round.?” 

“I wakened her to take some soup and biscuit. Now 
I hope she will sleep till morning.” 

“And you told her it was me brought her ashore.?” 

“Yes, I told her that. She will thank you herself.” 

“Did you find out who she is and where she hails 
from.?” 

“Not yet. There’ll be time enough to learn all that. 
My only desire was to get some nourishment inside her. 
She’ll be building up now all the time she’s sleeping.” 

“An’ she’s a good-looking bit of goods, eh.?” asked 
the mate, as they sat eating. 

“Very good-looking, I should say, and pulling round 
quickly. A gentlewoman without doubt.” 

“And how can ye tell that now.? There’s many a 
good-looking hussy that’s not gentle-born.” 

“Undoubtedly,” said Wulfrey, looking across the fire 
at him. “But this isn’t one of that kind. She’s a lad}^ 
to the finger-tips.” 

“Ah — too fine a lady to live on a ship with the likes 
o’ you and me, mebbe,” growled the mate. “All same. 


136 


MAID OF THE MIST 


if ’t ’adn’t bin for me her leddyship ud be no more’n a 
little white corp tumbling about out yonder in its little 
white shift.” 

“Quite so,” said Wulfrey, on whom this insistence on 
his sole claim to the salvaging of her was beginning to 
pall. “And if it hadn’t been for me your bringing her 
ashore wouldn’t have been of much service to her. So 
suppose we say no more about it. We’ll divide the 
honours.” 

“If I hadn’t brought her ashore ye couldn’t have 
brought her round,” growled the mate. 

“Six of one and half a dozen of the other.” 

“No six of anything. Ye can’t deny I brought her 
ashore.” 

Wulfrey lit his pipe and went up on deck, wondering 
what was working in the curious fellow’s brain now. 

When he went down again he found that Macro had 
opened his bundles and spread their contents out to dry, 
and had turned in. He just glanced at the varied as- 
sortment, and then, not to disturb his patient by going 
anywhere near her, spread some blankets in the room 
next to the mate’s, and turned in himself. But he lay 
awake for a long time, wondering if the introduction of 
this new element into the limited circle of their lives was 
like to make for peace or otherwise. 

XXVII 

Wulfrey was up early, after a restless night, anxious 
to see how his patient fared. It was such a morning as 
usually followed their storms — clear and bright and 
sunny, with a pale-blue wind-swept sky, and a crisp 
breeze that tipped the green of the waves outside with 
white. 

The first time he went softly in she was still sleeping, 
and with much satisgaction he noted the improvement 


MAID OF THE MIST 


137 


the food and rest had wrought in her. Her face had 
filled out, the cheek-bones were less prominent, the dark 
circles round her eyes were not nearly so pronounced as 
before, though he imagined the long dark lashes and 
level brows would always lend a sense of depth and 
witchery to the great dark eyes themselves. The slight 
salting and roughening of the skin would speedily cure 
itself under the application of fresh water. She was 
almost herself again. 

Their fire, on its bed of sand, was never allowed to go 
out. The supply of wood was unlimited and always, in 
the depths of the heap of white ashes, was a golden core 
of heat only waiting to be fed. So he set to and pre- 
pared coffee for her, and some flour-and-water biscuits, 
and when he went in again she was awake. She turned 
her head and looked at him, and his heart beat quicker 
than was its wont. 

Her eyes, he perceived, were very dark blue, almost 
black, and looked the darker for the dark fringing 
lashes. They were very beautiful eyes, he decided, and 
very eloquent, — there was something of apprehension 
in them when first they met his, but it vanished when he 
spoke. 

“You are better, I can see. You slept well.?” 

“I have only just wakened. You are the doctor.” 

“Yes, I am the doctor. I have got some coffee for 
you and some biscuits. I will get them.” 

“You are very good,” as he came in with them and 
she raised herself on to her elbow again. “Did your 
friend get me any clothes.? I feel quite well, and I 
would get up.” 

‘He brought a whole heap of things. They have 
been spread out all night, but I’m afraid they’ll never 
dry properly till they are washed in fresh water.” 

“And have you fresh water.?” 

“Oh, plenty, — ashore there, in pools. If you can 


138 


MAID OF THE MIST 


select a few things I will go across and steep them. 
They will soon dry in the sun.” 

“You are very good,” she said again, and sipped the 
coffee and glanced up at him with a somewhat wry face. 
“No, you have no sugar on this strange ship — nor milk. 
Nor a brush, nor a comb. I’ll be bound. Nothing but 

>5 

“A brush and a comb we can provide at all events, 
and of exceptional quality. They belonged, I believe, 
to His Royal Highness the Duke of Kent.” 

‘Edward of Kent.^^” she asked quickly. “Why — 

how. . . .” 

“Some ship, bringing home his belongings from Can- 
ada, must have been wrecked here. We have found 
quite a number of his things.” 

“Well, he would not mind my using them,” she said 
quietly. “He is of a pleasant temper, quite the nicest 
of them all” ; and as she finished the coffee and biscuits, 
“If you could find me ... a brooch — no, you will not 
have a brooch! ... a large pin or two, — but no, you 
will not have any pins ! . . . Let me see, then, — a sharp 
splinter of wood ” 

“I can get you all the splinters you want. Might 
I ask ” 

“To pin some of these blankets about me, do you see, 
— so that I may get up. And if you would get me that 
royal brush and comb ” 

He trimmed up half a dozen sharp little skewers and 
left them witl:^ her, together with the brush and comb, 
and plunged overboard for his morning swim. 

The mate was sitting by the fire at his breakfast 
when he went down again. 

“Well.? — how is my lady this mornin.?” he asked. 

“So well that she is getting up.” 

“Them clothes all right.?” 

“She will pick out what she wants. But they’ll never 


MAID OF THE MIST 139 

dry with the salt in them. I’ll rinse them in one of the 
pools as soon as she says which.” 

“There’s more mebbe for the finding ” and then 

they heard the door of her little room open and she 
came into the cabin to them. 

The mate jumped up and stood staring as if she were 
a ghost; and even Wulfrey, who had already made her 
acquaintance, eyed her with surprise, and was con- 
firmed in the idea that had been growing in him that 
there was foreign blood in her. He doubted if any Eng- 
lishwoman could have made so brave a showing out of 
such poverty of material. 

Fastened simply with her wooden skewers, she had 
one blanket draped about her as a skirt, and another 
covered her shoulders, with a high peak behind her neck, 
like a monkish cloak. And inside this rough calyx the 
fair white column of her neck rose out of its surround- 
ing frillery like the stamen of a flower from its nest of 
petals. Her abundant hair, combed and brushed, but 
still lacking somewhat of its natural lustre, was coiled 
about her head in heavy plaits. 

Though her garments were only rough blankets they 
were so disposed about her person that she stood be- 
fore them tall and slim and graceful. Her eyes and 
face were all aglow at the novelty of her situation. Her 
feet were bare. 

She sailed up to the mate with outstretched hand. 

“It was you who brought me ashore out of that 
terrible sea,” she said, and her voice was no longer 
hoarse and husky. “I thank you with all my heart.” 

Macro ducked his head but never took his eyes off 
her. 

“Gosh! Ye looked very different then, miss,” he 
jerked. “We scarce expected ye’d ever come round like 
this.” 

“I am the more grateful. But — what a wonderful 
room you have!” — as she looked round at the mate’s 


140 


MAID OF THE MIST 


barbaric hangings. “Silks and satins ! — and such 
gorgeous colours !” 

“There’s bales of them about, miss, and you’re very 
welcome to them. They’d look better on you than them 
blankets.” 

“But the blankets are warm, and the dreadful chill 
of the sea is still in my thoughts all the time. Now I 
would go on deck and understand about this strange 
ship of yours,” and Macro hastened to lead the way 
and Wulfrey followed. 

“But it is truly amazing,” she said, as she gazed 
round at the sandhills and the spit, at the tumbling 
waves beyond, and the unruffled waters of the lake. 

“And another ship! Who lives there 

“No one. There is not another soul on the whole 
island but we three,” said Wulfrey. 

“It sounds dreadfully lonely.” 

“It is not so lonely as the sea.” 

“No, it is not so lonely as the sea. The sea is dread- 
ful, and oh, so-o-o cold when you are dying in it slowly, 
an inch at a time,” and she shivered again at the recol- 
lection. V 

“You must try to forget all about it.” 

“I shall never forget it. That is not possible. The 
memory of it is frozen into my soul. What noise is 
that.?” she asked, listening intently with her hand up- 
lifted. 

“It’s a great cloud of sea-birds that haunts the 
island. All the wrecks come ashore at that end, and 
they live there most of the time.” 

“It is like the wailing of lost souls.” 

“Right, miss 1” broke in Macro. “That’s what it is. 
They’re only birds, mebbe, but there’s the souls of the 
dead inside ’em, an’ sometimes they’re fair deevils when 
they come screaming round in a storm.” 

“I could believe that, — the souls of the dead without 
a doubt.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


141 


“Suppose we turn to something pleasanter,” sug- 
gested Wulfrey. “Perhaps you will choose out the 
things you think most suitable from all that the mate 
brought over from the wrecks?” 

“From the wrecks?” . . . and she glanced at him 
doubtfully with a little shiver. “It does not sound 
too nice.” 

“We will bring them up. You wilJ see them better 
here,” and they spread the deck with Macro’s latest 
importations. 

“Mon Dieu, mon Dieu !” murmured she, as she turned 
them over with curious fingers, and held them up to 
adjudge their style and make. “But they are things of 
the days before the flood ! . . . They are too amazing ! 
. . . They are wonderful beyond words !” 

“Could ye no alter them to your needs, mebbe.'^” sug- 
gested Macro hopefully. 

“Perhaps — with needle and thread and scissors. But 
have you these?” 

“Mebbe I can find ’em for ye. There’s the cargoes 
of hunderds o’ ships out there. Ye can find a’most any- 
thing if ye look long enough. And mebbe there’s newer 
things if I can light on ’em.” 

“And some shoes and stockings, think you? I would 
be very glad of them. It feels strange to go with bare 
feet.” 

“I’ll find ’em if there’s any there.” 

“It is very good of you. I thank you. Could I per- 
haps come too?” 

The idea evidently appealed strongly to him. He 
looked at her eagerly, and hesitated, but finally said, 
“It’s no easy getting there. There’s over six miles’ 
walk through the sand, then near a mile of wading up 
to your neck in the water, and sometimes a bit of a 
swim, all according to the tide. Some day, mebbe. I’ll 
mek a bit raft to tek ye across from the point there — 


142 


1 MAID OF THE MIST 


just to see what it’s like. But ye want these things and 
I’ll get along quicker alone.” 

‘‘I thank you all the same. It will be for some 
other time then,” and Macro let himself down on to his 
raft and paddled away to the spit. She stood watch- 
ing him till he landed and set off at speed towards the 
point. 

“He is truly good-hearted,” she said, as he disap- 
peared. “He is not all English.?” 

“He is from the islands off the west coast of Scot- 
land, but he confesses to a strain of Spanish blood 
also.” 

“And why confesses.? It is not, I suppose, his own 
doing. One confesses to a fault. Is a strain of foreign 
blood a sin in your eyes then. Monsieur le Docteur.?” 
she asked, with pointed emphasis. 

“By no means. I should have said he rejoices in it.” 

“We English — British, I should say,” — with a fleet- 
ing gleam of a smile — “are too apt to look upon all for- 
eigners as of lower breed than ourselves, which is quite 
a mistake and leads to much misunderstanding. Every 
nation has distinctive qualities of its own, is it not so.?” 

“Undoubtedly. And unless one knows them by per- 
sonal experience one should not pass judgment. I must 
confess to being nothing of a traveller.” 

“How came you here.?” she asked abruptly. 

“I was bound for America — or Canada, with the in- 
tention of settling out there. It looks now, according 
to the mate, as though this strip of sand has got to 
suffice us for the rest of our lives.” 

“Really.?” . . . with a startled look. “Is there no 
getting away then.? Does no one ever come here?” 

“None but dead men, if they can help it, apparently. 
You were an exception to the rule. So were we. We 
have none of us any right to be here alive.” 

“If I had some shoes and stockings, and some proper 


MAID OF THE MIST 


143 


clothes, I believe I could be quite happy here,” she said. 
‘‘That is if one has not also to starve.” 

“There is no need to starve. The island is over-run 
with rabbits. There are fish in the lake here if only we 
could catch them, and out there among the wreckage 
are all kinds of things — casks of pork and beef, and 
coffee, and rum, and flour — enough to last us for hun- 
dreds of years.” 

“It is a most excellent retreat.” 

“If one were sick of the world. But you surely are 
too young to have arrived at that stage.” 

“One may be young and yet be sick of one’s world. 
. . . Sometime I will tell you. . . . Now, if you please, 
I will take a few of these things and you will show me 
your pool and I will wash them ” 

“Oh, I’ll do all that for you ” 

“Not at all. Besides, with your permission and if 
you will leave me quite alone, I would like also to wash 
in fresh water. I too shall never feel quite dry until I 
have done so.” 

He assisted her down to the other raft, through a 
break they had long since made in the side for that pur- 
pose, and paddled ashore. There he showed her the 
pool they had set apart for washing, and told her he 
would come back for her at whatever time she chose. 

“In two hours, please,” and he went off into the sand- 
hills. 

But his mind stubbornly refused to interest itself in 
rabbits. He dropped down on the sunny side of a hum- 
mock and let his thoughts run on this most surprising 
addition to their company. What could possibly ex- 
plain her, — young, beautiful, of undoubted birth and 
breeding, yet ready to renounce the world, of which 
her twenty years or so had apparently given her a sur- 
feit, and to welcome the chance of a hermit life.?’ 

It was a puzzle beyond any man’s understanding. All 
his thinking led him only towards shadowy possibilities. 


144 


MAID OF THE MIST 


And these the thought of her sweet face and clear frank 
outlook rejected instantly as libels on her fair fame, 
which he, with no more knowledge than he now had, yet 
felt himself prepared to defend with all his might 
against the whole world. If that girl was not all that 
she seemed and that he believed her to be, he would 
never trust his own judgment again. 

All the same, it was very amazing, and she filled his 
thoughts to such an extent that the rabbits hopped 
fearlessly about him as he sat thinking of her; and it 
was long after the two hours before he came to himself, 
and rewarded their temerity by knocking a couple on 
the head and striding away back to find her. 

She was sitting waiting for him, with a fresh-water 
brightness in her face, her hair coiled loosely round her 
head and her washing still drying in the sun. She 
hastily bundled up her things at sight of him and came 
along to meet him. 

“I began to fear you had forgotten me,” she said. 

“Very much to the contrary. It was our dinner I 
came near forgetting,” and he dangled the rabbits be- 
fore her. “You feel better for the fresh water 

“Oh, very much better. And now I am hungry. 
When does your friend come back.?” 

“Not till evening as a rule. If he can lay hands on 
what you want he may come sooner to-day.” 

“And you — do you never go out there with him.?” 

“Oh, sometimes. But it doesn’t attract me as it does 
him.” 

“Why then?” 

“We are differently made, I suppose; — which is per- 
haps a good thing. He delights in finding things out 
there, I go out only for necessaries.” 

“What does he find — besides strange old clothes .?” 

“Oh, heaps of things — treasure. There are the car- 
goes of very many ships out there. They have been ac- 
cumulating for hundreds of years, I suppose.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


145 


“And it does not attract jou?” 

“Not in the slightest.” 

“You are, perhaps, rich.” 

“I have enough, and I have my profession, — and little 
chance apparently of making any use of either.” 

“Ah . . .” and presently, “As to that, am I wrong 
then in thinking that if you had not been here I would 
most likely not have been here either .P” and the wind 
and the sun had whipped a fine colour into her face. 

“You would, perhaps, not be very far wrong.” 

“I remember it dimly, and in broken bits, like a hor- 
rible dream, — the crash, the terrible noise of the waves, 
the shouting and the screaming. It was the Captain 
himself who tied me to that mast when everything was 
going to pieces. And when the waves washed over me, 
and I felt myself slowly dying, I would have loosed my- 
self if I could, to make an end. It was terrible to be 
so long of dying. And the cold of the sea ! — oh, it was 
a horror,” and she shivered again at the remembrance 
. . . “Then I died. . . . And then — long long after- 
wards — I found myself coming slowly back to life, and 
beginning to get warm again, with prickly pains like 
pins arnd needles all over me ” 

“That was your blood beginning to flow again.” 

“ 1 felt warm hands rubbing me — rubbing, rub- 

bing, rubbing. They must have rubbed for years, and, 
all the time, I was slowly coming back. They were very 
warm and soothing. And at last they rubbed me back 
to life.” 

“What was the name of your ship.^^” 

“The ‘Ben Lomond,’ from Glasgow to New York, and 
the Captain was J ohn MacDonald. It was a large ship 
and full of passengers. It is terrible to think of them 
all gone but me. — Oh, terrible ! — terrible !” 

“Might I ask your name — since we are like to be 
neighbours for the rest of our lives 


146 


MAID OF THE MIST 


“I am Avice Drummond,” she said, with a quick 
glance at him. ‘‘And you.^” 

“Wulfrey Dale.” 

“And the mate.?” 

“Sheumaish Macro, — or Hamish, I’m not sure 
which.” 

“It is the same. He is a good man.? — to be trusttid.?” 

“I have no reason to think otherwise, but I have only 
known him since we landed here. He is chock full of 
superstition ” 

“That is the Highlander in him.” 

“A bit hot-blooded too, and apt to boil over.” 

“That is the Spaniard.” 

“And he’s crazy after the spoil out yonder.” 

“The Highlander again. It is, as you say, perhaps 
just as well you do not care for it, or you might have 
quarrelled.” 

“He is welcome to it all as far as I am concerned.” 

“I am of his country. I can understand how he 
feels. It is the old riever spirit in him finding its op- 
portunity.” 


XXVIII 

He was vitally conscious of her proximity to him as 
they paced through the soft sand towards the raft. 
The sight of her pink toes popping in and out from 
under her blanket-skirt quickened his blood. He knew 
without looking when she glanced round at him now 
and again, as when he had asked her name. 

He had not thought that the feeling of a woman’s 
eyes upon him could stir him to such an extent, no mat- 
ter how wonderful they might be in their depths of elo- 
quent darkness. He knew all about women, — physi- 
cally, organically, professionally, and still held woman 
in reverence. Experience had taught him also that in 
reality he and his fellows knew very little about them 


MAID OF THE MIST 


147 


beyond merest surface indications, — that there were in 
most women, perhaps in all, deeps beyond man’s sound- 
ing, heights beyond his attainment, — a general elusive- 
ness mysteriously comprehensive of feelings, instincts, 
passions, emotions, nerves, mood, humours, vapours, 
which a wise man accepted without expecting ever fully 
to understand. 

That this shapely girl in her swathed blankets should 
affect him to such an extent that we was actually con- 
scious of a superb new joy in living, of an absolute re- 
juvenescence, of a vitalising of all his energies, was a 
very great surprise to him. He could feel the blood 
running redder in his veins. His heart beat more 
briskly than it had done since he landed on the island. 

But after three months of nothing but Macro and 
rabbits and screaming birds, it was not to be wondered 
at after all, he reasoned to himself. Life had been run- 
ning on a low level. There had been nothing to lift 
them above the mere satisfaction of their bodily neces- 
sities. Eating, sleeping, getting through the days had 
sufficed them. 

And here, into that rough husk of a life, had sud- 
denly come a soul, to animate them both to higher 
things, even though it were no more than the minister- 
ing to her more delicate necessities. 

Even Macro was feeling it, and was toiling out yon- 
der, not for himself but for her. Without doubt life 
was immensely more worth living than it had been two 
days ago. 

It was a joy even to cook for her, though he had al- 
ways detested the preparation of food. To know be- 
forehand what one was going to eat was sufficient to 
reduce one’s appetite. To superintend a i/i^al through 
all its stages, from raw to ready, put anything beyond 
the mere filling of an internal void out of the question. 

But cooking for himself and cooking for her were 
matters of very different complexion, and he found him- 


148 


MAID OF THE MIST 


self considering culinary enterprises which surprised 
him greatly. 

“You will let me help,” she said, when they had 
climbed on board, and she saw him setting to work on 
the rabbits. 

“Can you make biscuit 

“If there is anything to make it with,” so he pro- 
vided her with flour and water and a frying-pan, and 
tackled his own repulsive job, looking forward to the 
best-made biscuit they had had since they came ashore. 

“You have no butter — lard — dripping — fat — noth- 
ing?” she asked. 

“There is some fat pork. We stew it with the rabbit 
as a rule.” 

“Get me some and I will render it down and we shall 
have much better cakes. Men never know how to cook 
unless they are trained to it. You have no seasonings 
of any kind — no Nor salt?” 

“Not a scrap.” 

“We might And something on shore there. I saw 
many little plants. We will search next time we go.” 

Yes, indeed, even the repellent cooking took on quite 
a new aspect and became a joyous pastime in her com- 
pany, and they presently sat down to such a meal as he 
had not tasted since he left Liverpool. Many a more 
abundant one he had had, but none with such a flavour 
to it, and that was due entirely to the deft white hands 
that had helped to prepare it. 

Meals hitherto had been in the nature of necessary 
nuisances. He and the mate had often sat eating with- 
out a word between them, and with perhaps less enjoy- 
ment in it than the rabbits out there among the foot- 
hills. But, henceforth, meals would be feasts full of 
delight because of this stranger girl, whose presence 
would be salt and savour and seasoning to the poorest 
of fare. 


MAID OF THE MIST 149 

“And lie — the mate, — when does he eat?” she asked 
suddenly, after they had begun. 

“Not till he gets back, — at night-fall as a rule. It’s 
a good long way, you see, and he likes to spend all his 
time working.” 

“I hope he will find me some shoes, — and some needles 
and thread. Then I shall feel much happier. . . . And 
you really think we shall never get away from here?” 
she asked, quite cheerfully. 

“If we could prevail on Macro to think of building a 
boat, instead of amassing treasure-trove, we might at 
all events try it. Nova Scotia is but a hundred miles 
away, he says, ” 

“So close?” 

“uBt he seems to think it a risky voyage, and so far 
we have come across no tools with which to build. You 
see, they are not things likely to come ashore.” 

“For myself, I believe I could be qiute content to live 
here,” she said again. 

“For ever.? — Never to get back to the larger life of 
the world as long as you lived?” 

“Ah — that! ... I do not know. ... It is a very 
hollow life after all, that larger life of the world.” 

“To grow old here,” he said thoughtfully, emphasis- 
ing his points with slowly nodding head. “To be the 
last one left alive perhaps. . . . To be all alone, sick, 
starving, dying slowly in the dark, unable to lift a 
finger. . . .” 

“I would drown myself if it came to that. It sounds 
horrible. . . . Perhaps, after all, we had better build 
the boat and get away.” 

‘But I don’t know that we can. I know nothing about 
boat-building even if I had the tools, and Macro won’t 
turn to it till he has raked through the wreckage, and 
that will take him about a hundred years. It grows 
with every storm, you see.” 

“We must make him.” 


150 


MAID OF THE MIST 


“And the tools?” 

“We must find them.” 

“Two difficult jobs, perhaps impossible ones. You 
might perhaps prevail on Macro, but even he can do 
nothing without tools. . . . But, if I may venture to 
say so — it is surely early days for you to have discov- 
ered the hollowness of life, and to feel ready to spend 
the rest of it on a sandbank. Life should hold more in 
it than that for you.” 

She looked meditatively across at him for a mo- 
ment, then seemed to make up her mind. “It is natural 
you should wish to know. ... I will tell you. ... It 
is a somewhat sorry story, but I think you will under- 
stand. . . . My name told you nothing?” 

“Nothing — except that it was a very pretty name.” 

“I feared it would. It is natural, I suppose, to im- 
agine that the whole world knows of one’s misfortunes. 
Have you ever heard of the Countess d’Ormont?” 

“The name is familiar to me in some way,” he said, 
staring at her in surprise at the trend this was taking. 
“But I cannot recall ” 

“And the Comte d’Artois ” 

“Of course !” he nodded. “Now I remember ” 

“The Countess d’Ormont was Margaret Drummond, 
my mother. My father is Charles Philippe, Comte 
d’Artois, brother of the poor King, Louis, whose head 
they cut off ; and I hate and detest him for his treat- 
ment of her. . . . She is dead, my poor dear one ! . . . 
She believed at first that she was properly married to 
him, and I have no doubt she was — in London. He is a 
poor thing, but he was very fond of her, for a time. 
. . . I was born at Chantilly. It was before his quar- 
rel with the Due de Bourbon, and we lived in Paris and 
elsewhere according to his caprice. When my mother 
learned all the truth, and that in Paris she was not 
legally his wife, it broke her heart, I think. I never 
remembered her but as sad and troubled. Except on 


MAID OF THE MIST 


151 


my acount she was not sorry to die, I know. I was In 
Paris all through the Red times, and saw — oh, mon 
Dieu, — the horrors of it all ! — things I could never for- 
get if I lived to be a thousand. ... In London we 
were all very badly off. . . . But he liked to have me 
with him, and poor Mme de Polastron was very good to 
me, but she was a strange, strange woman. . . . Her 
death was a great blow to him . . . and a great loss 
to me. He was really very badly off there, and I did 
not like the people he had about him, — de Vaudreuil, 
de Roll, du Theil, and the rest, and I made up my mind 
to seek my own life elsewhere. And that is about all.” 

‘‘And you have friends in America — relatives per- 
haps?” 

“My mother’s people, in Virginia. They have pros- 
pered there. . . . The new life out there, where all men 
are equal, appeals to me. Now you understand why I 
would not have cared very much if Mr Macro had not 
brought me ashore and if you had not rubbed me back 
to life. I seem to have no place in the world. I hate 
the aristocrats for what my mother suffered at their 
hands, and I hate the others for the terrible scenes I 
passed through as a child. These things are stamped 
into my heart and brain for ever. And that is why this 
lonely island, far away from it all, seems better to me 
than any place I know.” 

“You would grow tired of it.” 

“I could never grow as sick of it as I did of what I 
have left. It is not perhaps a very full life, but neither 
is it hollow and heartless. You I can trust, and Mr. 
Macro also. It is lonely, but it is sweet and peace- 
ful ” 

“Wait till you see it in a storm.” 

“Storms are nothing when you have seen Paris drunk 
with blood. Ach ! — the horror of it !” and she flung out 
her hands in a gesture full-charged with terrible memo- 


152 


MAID OF THE MIST 


ries, and then pressed them over her eyes as though to 
blot it all out. 

“Well, we will do all in our power to make things 
comfortable for you, for as long as we have to stop 
here. . . . For your sake I hope it will not be long. 
Life should hold more for you than this,” said Wulfrey, 
and mused much on the beautiful stranger and her 
strange history, and wondered what the future held for 
them all. 

The mate came back when it was growing dark, very 
tired and in none too good a humour at the poverty of 
his finds. The results of a hard day’s work, so far as he 
disclosed them, were a number of rusty sail-maker’s 
needles which he had found in a chest, and half a dozen 
pairs of shoes, sodden almost out of semblance to 
leather. 

Miss Drummond, however, was delighted and thanked 
him heartily. 

“You will lend me a knife, and out of some of your 
beautiful silks I will make a new dress. I shall like that 
better than wearing any of those ancient ones which 
belonged to the dead.” 

“You’re very welcome, miss. I broke into more’n a 
score of chests and boxes and not a blessed stocking 
among the lot. And them shoes are pretty bad, but 
they were best I could find.” 

“I will rub them with fat and ‘ they will return all 
right, and the needles will come bright with sand. I 
shall do very well now. Thread I can get from a piece 
of your linen. I thank you very much. Now you will 
eat some of my cakes.” 

“Best cakes ever I tasted,” he said with a full mouth. 
“Takes a woman to cook properly. And best day’s 
work I done since I got here, fishing you out the wa- 
ter.” 

“Perhaps — I am not yet sure, but I thank you all 


MAID OF THE MIST 


153 


the same. When will you begin to build a boat for us 
to get away in 

“Ah! , . . Building a boat needs tools. What for 
do you want to get away so quick You’re but just got 
here.” 

“At present I am content. But — for always? I am 
not sure.” 

“Doctor, there, is always wanting to get away. But 
he knows we can’t build a boat without tools. An’ I 
put it to him — has he so much as set eyes on a tool out 
yonder since we come ashore.?” 

“I can’t say I have, but then I haven’t seen as much 
of the wreckage as you have. There may be any 
amount of ” 

“Oh, ay, there mebbe ! But so far we haven’t struck 
’em, an’ it’s no good talking o’ boats till we got the 
tools.” 

“We will look for them,” said The Girl confidently. 

“Oh, ay, ye can look for ’em, and mebbe sometime a 
boat’ll come ashore ready-made, or one that we can 
make shift to patch up. Meantime we’ve got all we 
want here and there’s plenty more for the getting out 
yonder. So be content, say I, miss, for by rights the 
Doctor and me ought to be two clean-picked white skel- 
etons out there on the pile, an’ you ought to be a little 
white corp tumbling about on yon spar for the birds 
to peck at.” 

“Are there skeletons out there?” she asked with a 
shiver. 

“Heaps.” 

“I think I will not go. I have seen so much of Death. 
I would forget it for a time.” 

“Ye’ll meet him sure if ye try to get across from here 
in any boat we could build,” growled the mate, and 
filled his pipe and his pannikin. 


154 


MAID OF THE MIST 


XXIX 

Next morning Macro went off as usual to the wreck- 
pile, and Miss Drummond set to work on her dress- 
making. Wulfrey hoisted up out of the hold for her 
such pieces of silk and linen as she required, and scoured 
a couple of the smallest needles with sand till they were 
usable. Then, with the sharpest knife he could find 
among their stock, he cut out on the deck, under her 
direction, various lengths and designs which to him 
were meaningless, but replete with possibilities from her 
point of view. 

But when, presently, she saw him preparing to go 
ashore for water and rabbits, she threw down her 
needle and said, “I will go also. You will not mind.^” 

“On the contrary, I shall mind very much. I shall 
feel honoured by your company. It is a pleasure to 
have someone to talk to again,” and he helped her down 
on to the raft, and thought how much less interesting 
shoes were than little naked feet. 

“Do you not then talk much with Mr Macro?” 

“Sometimes, and sometimes we hardly spoke all day.” 

“You quarrelled?” 

“Hardly that, but . . . well, we had not very much 
in common, you see. His mind was always full of his 
discoveries out there, and one got rather tired of it at 
times.” 

“I do not think I shall like him as much as I 
thought.” 

“Why that? I’m sorry if I have said anything that 
seems to reflect on him in any way.” 

T am used to judging for myself. It is a look that 
comes into his eyes at times, — like a horse when it is 
going to bite. No,” — with a decided little nod, — “I 
shall not like him as much as I hoped ; and I am sorry. 


MAID OF THE MIST 155 

for I ought to feel grateful to him for pulling me out 
of the water.” 

‘T’m glad you are feeling grateful for being alive, 
anyway,” he said, with a smile. “That is better than 
being doubtful about it.” 

“It is better to be alive than dead. And if we have 
to live here all our lives — very well, we must put up with 
it. And if you and he die, and I am left all alone, and 
get old and sick, as you said yesterday, I will make an 
end of myself. I was thinking about it all night except 
when I was sleeping.” 

“I’m sorry to have troubled you so. We will hope 
for better things. Anyway I have no intention of dying 
for some time to come, if I can help it.” 

“You must not,” she said, with sudden deep earnest- 
ness. ‘I count it God’s good mercy that you are here, 
for I can trust you.” 

“I am used to being trusted,” he said quietly. 

“I know. I can see it. ... If I had been all alone 
. . . with nobody but him . . . But, no ! I could not 

“I don’t know that there is any harm in him.” 

She sat nodding her pretty head meaningly. . . . 
“You have not seen men loosed from all restraints as 
I have. I was but a child and did not fully understand. 
But I see their faces and their eyes still, fierce and wild 
and hungry for other than bread. When men are an- 
swerable to none but themselves they become wild beasts 
and devils.” 

“It is a hard saying.” 

“But it is true. I have seen it.” 

“And women 

“They are as bad, but in a different way. Oh, they 
are terrible.” 

“And you and I and Macro here.? To whom are we 
answerable.?” he asked, to sound her to the depths. 

“He is answerable to you,” she said quickly. “You 


156 


MAID OF THE MIST 


and I are answerable to one another, and to God, and to 
ourselves — to all that has made us what we are. I do 
not think you could trespass outside all that, any more 
than I could.” 

‘T do not think I could. I am honoured by your 
confidence in me.” 

He helped her ashore, and they filled the buckets at 
the pools, and then she expressed a wish to see some- 
thing more of this sandbank where they might have to 
pass the rest of their lives. 

So they threaded their way among the hummocks to 
the northern shore, and, at the first green valley they 
came to, she went down on her knees and examined 
carefully the nestling growths on which the rabbits fed, 
and found among them certain pungent little plants 
which she thought might serve for flavouring, and they 
gathered enough to experiment with. 

The firm smooth tidal beach, with the ripples cream- 
ing up it in sibilant whispers tempted her to bare feet, 
and she handed him her shoes and splashed along as 
joyously as a child. 

“It is a most delightful island,” she said. “I do not 
think I would ever tire of it.” 

“Oh, yes, you would. It is all just the same, you see. 
You can walk on and on like this and round the other 
side for forty or fifty miles, and every bit of it is just 
like the rest.” 

“I think it is beautiful.” 

“It gets monotonous in time. The only diversion is 
the pile of wreckage down yonder. That is constantly 
changing and growing.” 

“And discovering more skeletons ! It feels odd to 
think that I should have been one myself if you two 
had not happened to be here.” 

“I’m sure it feels very much nicer to be comfortably 
clothed with flesh,” and glancing at her supple grace 
and entrancing bare feet and ankles, he found himself 


MAID OF THE MIST 


157 


profoundly grateful for the facts of the case. The 
thought of her as a skeleton was eminently distasteful 
to him. 

“Yes, it is better. Dead bodies and bones have al- 
ways had a horror for me; but not the simple fact of 
being dead, I think. ... I do not think I would be 
afraid to die — if it were not very painful. But . . . 
well, the thought of my dead body is horrid to me. I 
would not like to see it.” 

“You’re not likely to be troubled to that extent any- 
way.” 

“No, one is at all events spared that. But why do 
you talk of such unpleasant things when the sun is 
shining and the waves are sparkling Tell me about 
yourself. All you have <old me so far is that you are a 
doctor, and that your name is Wulfrey Dale. I never 
heard the name Wulfrey before. And that you were 
going out to Canada when you were wrecked here. Why 
were you going out.?” 

He would have liked to be as frank with her as she 
had been with him. But that was impossible. Another 
woman’s good name was too intricately interwoven with 
his story, and the whole matter was so open to mis- 
judgment. If he tried to explain he must either label 
that other woman as murderess or himself as an in- 
capable doctor, and he chose to do neither. He wished 
she had not asked, but found it only natural that she 
should desire to know all about him. 

“I have nothing much to tell,” he said. “I come from 
Hazelford, in Cheshire. My father had the practice 
there and when he died I succeeded to it. But the wan- 
der-spirit seized me. I wanted a larger sphere. The 
new world called, and I came, — as it turns out to a still 
smaller place ” 

“But we are not going to stop here all our lives. We 
must build that boat and get away.” 

“We will live in hope, anyway, but for that we are 


158 


MAID OF THE MIST 


dependent on Macro, and he’s not an easy man to 
drive.” 

“We will see,” she said confidently. “How do you 
catch your rabbits 

“Every one of these little valleys is full of them. As 
soon as you appear they all bolt for their holes and in 
the panic they stumble over one another and you pick 
them up.” 

“I am always sorry to kill things, and they are so 
pretty,” she said, as they crept cautiously up the side 
of the nearest hummock. “But they are very good and 
I suppose one must eat.” 

“Or starve. Now — see!” and he jumped down into 
the hollow, which scurried into life under his feet, and 
came back in a moment with a couple of rabbits which 
he had already knocked on the head. 

“Poor little things 1” she said, stroking the soft fur. 

“They were dead before they knew it. . . . Our lake 
ends there,” he said, pointing it out to her from where 
they stood on top of the hummock. “But the island 
goes on and on, all just the same as this as far as you 
can see.” 

“It looks very lonely . . . but I like it,” and she sat 
long, with her hands clasped round her knees, gazing 
out over the wandering yellow line of sandhills, and the 
slow-heaving seas which broke in white-fringed ripples 
along the beach. 

“And you left no ties behind you there in England 
she asked suddenly, showing where her thoughts had 
been. 

“No ties whatever. Friends in plenty, but nothing 
more. When my father died I was quite alone in the 
world.” 

She nodded fellow-feelingly, and they sauntered back 
in a somewhat closer intimacy of understanding and 
liking for one another. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


159 


XXX 

Macro had had a good day out there, and returned in 
the best of humours with himself and as hungry as 
usual. 

As he ate he enlarged on his finds, and when he had 
finished his supper he piled the fire with light sticks to 
make a blaze, and spread them out for Miss Drum- 
mond’s inspection. 

He had evidently lighted on the personal baggage of 
some person of quality. There were rings and brooches 
and pins and bracelets, of gold and silver, set with col- 
oured stones, a couple of small watches beautifully 
chased and studded with gems, a small silver-mounted 
mirror all blackened with sea-water, two gold snuff- 
boxes with enamelled miniatures on the lids — quite a 
rich haul and very satisfactory to the craving^ of his 
spirit. 

The Girl examined them all carefully, and Wulfrey, 
watching her quietly through the smoke of his pipe, 
though she handled them somewhat gingerly and dis- 
tastefully, and understood her feeling in the matter. 
And now and again he caught also a glimpse in the 
mate’s black eyes, as they rested on her, of that which 
she herself had felt and resented. 

It might be only the unconscious continuation of the 
gloating proprietorial look with which he regarded his 
treasures, which still gleamed in his eyes when they 
rested on hers as though she herself were but one more 
of them. But whatever it was it was not a pleasant 
look, and Wulfrey was not surprised at her discomfort 
under it. He was as devoutly glad that he was there 
as she could be. Alone with this wild riever, in whom 
the cross-strain of his wilder forebears was running to 
licence in its sudden emancipation from all life’s ordi- 
nary shackles. ... It would not bear thinking of. 


160 


MAID OF THE MIST 


Yes, he was truly glad he was there. And then he re- 
rpembered, with another grateful throb, that if he had 
not been there, neither would she have been. For the 
mate most assuredly would never have brought her 
back to life. 

‘‘Some of these are of value,” she was saying. “But 
they are rather pitiful to me. . . . Some dead woman 
has treasured them and she is gone. Perhaps you came 
upon her skeelton out there. . . . But they are not all 
real stones ” 

“And how can ye tell that now.?” asked Macro 
gruffly. 

“I can tell at once by the feel of them. That now” — 
pointing to a heavily-gemmed bracelet — “the emeralds 
are real, the rubies are real, but they are all small. The 
white stones are not diamonds, but very good imita- 
tions. They look almost as well, but they are not dia- 
monds. If they were that bracelet alone would be 
worth some hundreds of pounds.” 

“Deil take ’em! And you can tell that by feeling at 
’em.?” 

“I can tell in a moment. You see I have handled 
many jewels — some of the finest in the world, and I 
have seen very many imitations of them.” 

“The deil ye have ! How that.?” 

“I have lived among those to whom they belonged, 
and I am very fond of precious stones.” 

He went away to his own cabin and came back pres- 
ently with a good-sized bundle done up in blue velvet, 
and opened it before her. Wulfrey was surprised at the 
extent of his treasure-trove. For these were only his 
most precious possessions. He knew that he had in 
addition considerable store of silver articles which he 
had been allowed to examine from time to time. 

If Macro’s idea had been to dazzle her with his 
riches he must have been disappointed. For she greeted 
the display with a depreciatory “T’t — t’t!” — and said 


MAID OF THE MIST 


161 

presently, as she picked out a piece here and there for 
examination, “It looks like a peddler’s pack. . . . And 
it makes me sad to think of those to whom they be- 
longed. . . .” 

“They’ve no further use for them. And there’s no 
telling who they belonged to. They’re for any man’s 
getting now,” said Macro defensively. 

“I suppose so. All the same . . . For me — no !” 
with a most decided shake of the head. 

“Are they good, or is there false ones among them 
too.^” 

“Many are good,” she said, passing them rapidly 
and somewhat distastefully under her delicate fingers, 
“but not by any means all. ... You have laboured 
hard to accumulate so much.” 

“Harder than ever I worked in my life, but it suits 
me fine.” 

“But what good is it all unless you can get away 
from here and turn it to some good use.?^” 

“We’ll talk of that when I’ve got all I want, mebbe.” 

“You are like a miser then, ever accumulating and 
loth to spend.” 

“Just that ! Ye see I never had siccan a chance be- 
fore, — nor many others either. Ye wouldna care for a 
ring or two, or mebbe a bracelet or a brooch 

“Oh, I could not. It is good of you to offer, but 
. . . no, I thank you. They would always make me 
think of the skeletons out there. Poor things !” 

“They don’t hurt, and they’re aye laughing as if 
’twas all a rare joke,” which made her shiver with dis- 
comfort and draw her blanket closer round her neck at 
the back. 

“Well, well!” said he, with a hoarse laugh, as he 
made up his bundle again. “Folks has queer notions. 
Ef ’t ’adn’t been for me 

“And the Doctor,” she interposed quickly. 

“Ay — and the Doctor there ” 


162 


MAID OF THE MIST 


“I know,” she cut him short, ‘and it is very much 
nicer to be sitting here by a warm fire than tumbling 
about on a mast out there. I appreciate it, I assure 
you.” 

Perhaps it was to restore the balance of his spirits, 
which had suffered somewhat from the discovery that 
his treasure was not all he had thought it, that made 
him apply himself more heartily than usual to the rum 
cask that night. By the Doctor’s advice any water 
they drank from the brackish pools was mixed with a 
few drops of rum. Macro always saw to it that a cask 
was at hand, and he himself .took but small risks as far 
as the water was concerned. But he could stand a 
heavy load, and as a rule it only made him sluggish and 
uncompanionable. 

This night, however, as he sat dourly smoking, and 
taking every now and again a long pull at his handy 
pannikin, it seemed to set him brooding over things and 
at times he grew disputatious. 

Miss Drummond had turned with obvious relief to 
the Docor and said, “These things do not interest 
you.^” 

“As curiosities only, not intrinsically. I never had 
any craving for jewelry.” 

“It is a feminine weakness, I suppose, though I have 
known men who outvied even the women in their dis- 
play.” 

“We have simpler ways in the country, and more 
robust.” 

“Mebbe you’re right, and mebbe you’re wrong,” 
growled Macro, as the result of his cogitations. “I d’n 
know, an’ you d’n know, an’ Doctor, he d’n know, an’ 
none of us knows. . . . They’re mebbe all right. . . . 
What the deil wud folks want mixing bad stuff wi’ good 
like that.f^” 

“It is done sometimes to make a larger show, and 
sometimes as a matter of precaution,” said Miss Drum- 


MAID OF THE MIST 


163 


mond qiuetly. “Those who have valuable jewels are 
always in fear of having them stolen. They have imita- 
tions made, and wear them, and people believe they are 
the real ones. It is commonly done.” 

“An’ is it a thief you wud call me for taking these 

“These are dead men’s goods and dead women’s, and 
you do not know whose they were, so it is not stealing. 
But, for me, I do not like them.” 

“An’, for me, I do. An’ more I can get, better I’m 
pleased.” 

“Each to his taste, and you are very welcome to them 
all. Now, if you please, we will forget all about them, 
and speak of pleasanter things,” and she turned to 
Wulfrey and began questioning him as to his knowledge 
of London, which was not nearly so extensive as her 
own. 

The mate smoked and drank and glowered across at 
them. More than once Wulfrey caught his glance rest- 
ing balefully on The Girl. More than ever was he 
thankful that he was there to look after her. 


XXXI 

“No,” said The Girl to Wulfrey, as she sat busily sew- 
ing at her new dress on deck next morning, “I do not 
like your mate as much even as I thought. Do you 
know what I would do if you were not here 
“What would you do.?^” 

“I would go and live on that other ship, or else 
among the sandhills.” 

“Either would be very uncomfortable. I am glad I 
am here.” 

“He looks at me as though I were another piece of 
his treasure-trove, especially when he is getting drunk. 
If he had tried to wrap me up with the rest in that 


164 MAID OF THE MIST 

blue bundle of his I should not have been very much 
surprised.” 

“He brought you ashore, you see.” 

“Well.^ What use would that have been if you hadn’t 
brought me back to life 

“Not much, I’m bound to say. But I imagine he 
considers it gives him first claim on you.” 

“First claim.? — for what.?” she asked quickly. 

“Oh, on your regard, your gratitude, ” 

“My gratitude, if you like. My regard — that goes 
only where I can respect and esteem. And for him — 
neither. If he were never to come back again from 
over there I would not in the least regret it.” 

It was inevitable that these two should instinctively 
draw closer to one another, as that their doing so 
should create something of a breach betweem them and 
the mate, and that he should feel and resent it. 

Except the untoward circumstances of their lot there 
was practically nothing in common between him and 
them. His outlook and aims were as different from 
theirs as were his habits and upbringing. Yet it did 
seem preposterous to them that three persons, sit- 
uated as they were, should not be able to live together 
in peace and good-fellowship. 

To the ancients, without doubt, the gods would have 
been apparent behind the slow-drifting white-piled 
clouds, and behind the storm-wrack and the mists, 
laughing at the perverse little ways of men, and watch- 
ing with interest the inevitable tangle produced among 
them by the advent of a woman. 

Since the year one, two have found themselves good 
company and the coming of a third has led to mischief. 
And yet even that depends on the spirit that is in them. 
More than once, since he landed on the island, Wulfrey 
had found himself wishing Providence had sent him 
honest Jock Steele for company, and that it was the 


MAID OF THE MIST 


165 


mate’s bones that were "whitening out there in place 
of the carpenter’s. 

Whether he himself would have fared so well, if he 
had not stuck out his leg at risk of his life and helped 
the mate on to his raft, and so had come ashore alone, 
he was not sure. And again, whether, if he had been 
alone, he would ever have sighted The Girl on her 
mast, was doubtful. If they had much to put up with 
in Macro, they had also much to thank him for. And 
so — to bear with him as well as they might and give 
no occasion for offense if that were possible. 

But it was no easy matter. They were having a spell 
of fine weather which enabled him to go out to the 
wreckage every day. And every night he came home 
ravenous, and ate and drank and afterwards sat smok- 
ing with scarce a word. 

If they enquired how he had fared he growled, the 
curtest of answers, and showed plainly that their polite 
interest in his doings was not desired by him. He 
showed them none of his finds, but sat smoking dog- 
gedly, and occasionally gazing through his smoke at 
The Girl in a way that distressed and discomforted her. 

But there was nothing in it that Wulfrey could 
openly take exception to. Even a cat may look at a 
queen. The look in the mate’s hlack eyes was akin to 
that with which the cat favours the canary, when he 
licks his lips below its cage ; — if he only dared ! 

Still, they were free of him during the day, and the 
discomfort of him at other times but drew them closer 
together. But Wulfrey, watching the man cautiously, 
saw in him signs and symptoms that he did not like, 
which bade him be prepared for a possible change for 
the worse in their relationship. 

For one thing, he was drinking more heavily than 
he had ever done since they landed, and the drink and 
the brooding of his black thoughts might well hatch 
out unexpected evil to one or other of them. As he 


166 


MAID OF THE MIST 


lay there of a night, smoking and drinking, with a face 
of gloom and smouldering fires in his eyes, he was more 
than ever like a sleeping volcano which might burst 
forth in flame and fury at any moment. 

But for the lurking possibilities of trouble, the cool 
way in which he devoted himself to his own private con- 
cerns, and left them to attend to all the irksome little 
details of the common life, would have had in it some- 
thing of the humorous. 

Miss Drummond was indignant and was for leaving 
him supperless when he came home of a night. 

But Wulfrey rigorously repressed his strong fellow- 
feeling therewith, and determined that no provocation 
should come from their side. So they continued to 
make ample provision for all, and the mate helped him- 
self as if by right. If, however, good-feeling on the 
part of the maker has anything to do with the com- 
pounding of cakes, as The Girl averred, those she made 
for the mate must surely have lacked flavour, for her 
views on the matter were most uncompromisingly ex- 
pressed, both by hands and tongue, as she made them. 

‘‘Does he look upon us as his servants, then.^” — 
with a contemptuous slap at the innocent dough. — “To 
do all his work without so much as a ‘Thank you’.?^” — 
another vicious slap. “ — And to be glowered at as if 
one were a rabbit that he wanted to devour !” — cakes 
pitched disdainfully into a corner till the time came 
to cook them. — “No ! — for me, I wish he would stop 
out there among his skeletons and trouble us no more.” 

Her little tantrums at thought of Macro gave 
Wulfrey no little amusement. The vivacity of her man- 
ner as she delivered herself, blended as it was of Scottish 
frankness and French sparkle, made her altogether 
charming. He soothed her ruflled feeling,s however, by 
his own eulogistic appreciation of the cakes she pro- 
vided for their own use, and it was then that she 


MAID OF THE MIST 


167 


explained to him how intimately the character of a 
cake is associated with the feelings of its maker. 

Matters came to a head a few days later, when the 
commissariat department began to run low in certain 
essentials. 

“We’re almost out of flour and pork, Macro,” 
Wulfrey said to him, as the mate was preparing to set 
off as usual one morning. “Will you bring some back 
with you.P” 

The black-faced one hesitated one moment, and then 
cast the die for trouble. 

“Well, you know where to get ’em,” he growled. 

“Yes, I know where to get them,” and Wulfred 
braced himself for the tussle. “But ” 

“Well, then— 7get ’em, and be to you!” and he 

leaped down on to his raft and set off for the shore. 


XXXII 

Wulfrey watched the mate’s retreating figure for a 
minute or . two and then turned quietly to The Girl. 

“Are you prepared to trust me completely. Miss 
Drummond.?” he asked. 

“Absolutely. What is it you want me to do.?” 

“We cannot go on this way. He is becoming insuf- 
ferable. Unless you have anything to say against it, 
we will take possession of the other ship — you and I, 
and leave him here to himself.” 

“Yes — let us go. When shall we go? Now.?” 

“We must make it habitable first. It is as empty as 
a drum, you know.” 

“All the better, since we are overcrowded here with 
that man. It is to get away from unpleasantness that 
we go.” 

“We shall need fire, — that means sand for a hearth; 
and wood — we have heaps here; and cooking things — 


168 


MAID OF THE MIST 


we will take our fair share, and our blankets. Every- 
thing else I can get out yonder.” 

“Allons ! Let us go at once and get them.” 

He looked carefully round the horizon. ‘‘The 
weather will hold for a day or two still, I think. Today 
we had better lay our foundations — sand, wood and so 
on. Then tomorrow we will go out to the pile and 
take our cargo straight to the other ship.” 

“What do we do first .^” she asked, abrim with 
excitement. 

“We will take a load of wood across at once and 
then go for sand. We will leave the cabin open to 
air it and light a fire.” 

She was as eager as a child going to a new house, 
and when presently he helped her up over the side of 
the other schooner, she tripped to and fro delightedly, 
and could hardly wait till he forced back the rusty bolts 
of the cabin hatch with a piece of wood, so impatient 
was she to inspect the new home. 

“I like it better than the other,” she said, as they 
stood in the little cabin. 

“Why.^^ It seems to me just about the same.” 

“The man of gloom is not here. It makes all the 
difference.” 

They got their wood on board, and he tumbled it 
down the fore-hatch, which was easier to handle than 
the main. Then they went ashore, filled a bucket with 
fresh water, got half a dozen rabbits and a supply of 
the pungent herbs. . . . “Why so many.?” she asked, 
and he said quietly, “I don’t want to hit him below the 
belt,” — at which she laughed — “We can afford to be 
generous. The breach will be wide enough as it is.” 

Then they loaded the raft with sand, and getting 
back to the ship, arranged their hearth, and with his 
flint and steel succeeded at last between them in lighting 
a thin chip, which he ceremoniously handed to her and 
begged her to start their fire. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


169 


And as she knelt and applied it, and coaxed and 
blew till the cheerful flames shot up with a crackling 
shower of sparks, and the thin blue smoke streamed 
up the companion-way, still kneeling she waved her 
hands above it and said, “Light and warmth and com- 
fort and peace! God bless the fire!” and he endorsed 
it with a hearty “Amen!” and thought he had never 
seen a fairer sight. 

When the mate got home that night, he was some- 
what surprised to find a supply of food and no objec- 
tions made to his helping himself. He chuckled grimly, 
and showed by his face and manner that he considered 
the matter settled on eminently satisfactory lines. 

They made no enquiries as to his doings and he vol- 
unteered no information. Wulfrey and Miss Drum- 
mond talked together as if he were not there. He lay 
and smoked, and drank, and glowered at them. 

In the morning he set off as usual, and when they 
had taken their blankets and their fair share of cook- 
ing-utensils across to the ‘Martha,’ and got them all 
stowed away, Wulfrey turned to The Girl and said, 
“Now I will go out to the store-house yonder and get 
all I can lay hands on.” 

“I will come too. Perhaps I can help. I am very 
strong, and I would rather go with you than wait 
here alone. But I do not wish to see any skeletons if 
you can manage it.” 

“We will try to keep clear of them, — if you are quite 
sure ” 

“Have we got to swim, as that man said.?^” 

“I may have to. You need not. I will go out to 
the pile and make a raft, and take you across on it. 
And all that will take time, so the sooner we’re off the 
better.” 

They paddled across to the spit and hurried along 
to the point, as nondescript a pair as could well be 
imagined in desrepect of clothing, but in all else that 


170 


MAID OF THE MIST 


mattered — in all the great essentials that make for 
vigorous life — in health, good looks, and high and 
cheerful spirit — pre-eminently good to look upon. 

For work on the wreck-pile the less one wore the 
better; and so he was clad in one simple but sufficient 
garment, which consisted of a long strip of linen wound 
many times round his waist and falling o the knees 
like a South Sea Island kilt. And she wore one of the 
prehistoric woman’s sarks which Macro had brought 
over from the pile, and a similar, but slightly longer, 
kilt which swung gracefully a foot or so above her 
angles as she walked. 

He carried an axe in his hand, and had a knife at 
his back, in a seaman’s belt which he had unhooked 
from its owner’s body out there on the pile one day; 
and his face was somewhat grave and intent, since he 
was considering the possibilities of Macro’s violent re- 
jection of the situation he had himself created, and the 
consequences that would then ensue. But her bright 
face was all alive with the spirit of adventure and the 
novelty of this new departure. 

“We look like Adam and Eve turned out of Paradise, 
and setting out to conquer the world,” she laughed 
excitedly. “What would your friends think if they saw 
you so.^^” 

“What they thought wouldn’t trouble me in the 
slightest. If they understood they would understand. 
If they didn’t it would not matter. We are doing what 
has to done in the only way to do it. See the birds 
out there !” 

“Are those really all birds .? I thought it was a cloud 
whirling about,” and she stood and stared in amaze- 
ment. 

“Listen and you’ll hear them,” — and every now and 
again the south-west breeze brought them the thin 
strident wailing of the hungry myriads as they swooped 
and fought for their living. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


171 


‘‘They sound horrid,” said The Girl, with a sudden 
shadow on her face. “It is like the wailing of lost 
souls, as he said. Do they never attack you?” 

“We have had more than one fight with them. But 
you can always escape by slipping down into a crack 
or jumping into the sea. Where did you learn to 
swim ?” 

“We had a cottage in the Isle of Wight for a year, 
when first we came from France, and I grew very fond 
of the water.” 

“Do you see Macro over there?” as they came to 
the end of the point. “He’s hard at work. We’ll tackle 
a different part. If you will sit down here and rest, 
I will get across and be back as soon as I can.” 

“Could I not come with you?” 

“I don’t know how deep the channels may be. Some- 
times we can wade across, sometimes we have to swim.” 

“I don’t mind. It can’t make me any wetter than if I 
have to jump in because of the birds. And I have been 
wetter still.” 

“Very well. It will save much time,” and they waded 
out alongside one another, — The Girl catching her 
breath at times with spasmodic little jerks of laughter, 
as she stepped into unexpected depths or a wave came 
higher than usual; — and he, intent as he was on the 
business in hand, yet mightily cognisant of her prox- 
imity and the penetrating and intoxicating charm of it. 

When, at one sudden plunge, she gasped and clutched 
wildly at his bare arm, her touch sent the blood whirling 
through his veins. He took her soft wet hand, which 
was all of a tremble with excitement, in his strong and 
steady one, and she gripped it tightly and drew new 
strength from it. 

Out on the great pile of wreckage in front, but some- 
what towards their right, they caught glimpses now 
and again of Macro — a wild dark figure silhouetted 
against the pale-blue sky behind — as he climbed to and 


172 


MAID OF THE MIST 


fro, and stood at times, and swung up his arms and his 
club and smashed his way through to the desire of his 
heart. 

Wulfrey worked round to the left, and so came upon 
a channel which they had to swim. He fastened his 
axe into his belt at the back and they struck out 
together. He watched her anxiously at first, but was 
satisfied. She swam well and knowingly; they soon 
touched ground again, and another wade and another 
short swim brought them to the pile. 

The Girl had been regarding it with curious eyes 
and ejaculations of wonder. 

“But it is amazing!” she jerked, when at last they 
clung to a ledge of the chaotic jumble of flotsam and 
jetsam. “I never saw anything like it in my life.” 

“That’s just as well. Now we’ll climb up here, and 
you will rest while I gather wood and rope and make a 
raft. Then we’ll see what fortune sends us.” 

“Whatever are all those.?” she asked, when they had 
worked their way to the top, and stood looking round. 

“Those are the bones of the ships that have perished 
here. There are hundreds of them half-buried in the 
sand.” 

“It is the most amazing sight I ever set eyes on,” she 
said again, and sat and gazed at it all while he worked 
busily at the raft. 

“Now,” he said, climbing up to her again at last, 
“We will look for necessaries first and take anything 
else we come upon that may be useful. Those barrels 
are pork, but they are too heavy for us to handle ” 

“Couldn’t you break one open.?” 

“Then the birds would be on us like a shot. Some 
of them have got their eyes on us already,” and he 
pointed to them swooping watchfully round. “We did 
that once and had to fight and run for it. Maybe we’ll 
come across some smaller ones before we’re done. Here’s 
a small cask of rum. We’ll make sure of that,” and he 


MAID OF THE MIST 


173 


rolled and carried it to their landing-place, and they 
scrambled on. 

“These barrels are biscuits. Some of it may be 
good. We’ll bring the raft round for it. Those small 
casks are flour. It’s only good in the middle. We’ll 
come round for one of them presently. We want coflfee. 
We’re sure to come across some sooner or later.” 

“What is it like.?” 

“Small square cases about so big.” 

“Oh, I wonder what’s in this great case.” 

“We’ll soon see,” and he smashed at it with his axe. 
“Hardware. We’ll add to our stock since it’s here.” 

“And this.? Oh, I wish I had an axe too. I want to 
break open every box we come to,” and he laughed 
out at her quick surrender to the riever spirit. 

“Why do you laugh at me then? It would surely be 
helping you.” 

“I know just how you feel, and now you know just 
how Macro feels.” 

“I know just how he feels. It must grow upon one. 
I don’t want any of the things, but still I would like 
to break open and find.” 

“We’d better stick to business. When we’ve got all 
we come across that will be of service I’ll hand you 
the axe and you can smash away at anything you like, 
except your toes. ... No doubt what’s in that box 
anyway,” for the ends of rolls of silk were sticking out 
of it. “I expect Macro has been over this ground al- 
ready. Shall we take some.?” 

She picked out several rolls, saying: “They may come 
in useful, even if it’s only to make our cabin as fine 
as his,” and he stacked up the silk along with a raffle 
of rope, which was always to the good. 

They scrambled to and fro, so busily smashing open 
cases and discussing their contents that they took no 
note of the birds gathering above them in ever-increas- 
ing numbers. Their ears had grown accustomed to 


174 


MAID OF THE MIST 


their raucous clamour, and the fact that it had grown 
louder had not troubled them. But suddenly — they 
were delving into the side of a huge crate of blankets 
at the moment — the sky was darkened as by a cloud, 
and Wulfrey, glancing up in fear of a change in the 
weather, jerked out a sudden exclamation which made 
her jump. Then he crushed her roughly down into a 
narrow black chasm between the blanket-crate and an- 
other, and dropped in after her, just as the cloud, 
grown bold by its increase, came swooping down upon 
them. 

Never in her life had she imagined such a nightmare 
experience. The bristling confusion of the wreckage, 
the shimmering blue sea beyond, the very light and 
peace of day itself, all were blotted out in an instant, 
and in their place was nothing but a prodigious whirl- 
ing and swooping of vari-coloured feathered bodies, 
snaking necks, cold beady eyes, pitilessly craving them 
as food, cruel curved beaks keen to rend and tear, and 
a hideous clamour of wild wailings. The flutter and 
beat of myriad wings set the whole atmosphere throb- 
bing, till the blood drummed furiously in The Girl’s 
ears and her head felt like to burst. 

She shrank down on something that crackled and 
subsided under her, feeling herself terribly bare to their 
assault. Wulfrey reached out an arm and groped for 
a loose blanket and dragged it over them and so hid 
the nightmare from her. His arm was bleeding when 
he drew it in. 

“They will go presently when they find there is 
nothing to eat,” he said into her ear. 

“They looked as if they would tear one to pieces,” 
and he could feel the shudder that shook her. 

“They would try if they got the chance.” 

“They are awful. ... Oh, listen !” — as the rest of 
the cloud, sure that such a clamour portended food, 
whirled round their shelter, brushed it with wings and 


MAID OF THE MIST 


175 


feet, shrilled their needs and their disgust more loudly 
than ever, and swept away to seek more satisfying fare 
elsewhere. 

The sound of them drifted away at last, occasional 
stragglers still swooped down to make quite sure there 
was not a scrap left, but presently these followed the 
rest and Wulfrey climbed up and looked about him. 

“All right,” he said, and reached down a hand to 
her. “I think they’ve gone after Macro,” and he hauled 
her up into the light. 

“Your arm!” she cried. 

“Only scratches. No harm done. . . .What is it?” 
for she was staring with tragic face into the hole out 
of which she had just come. 

And looking down into it he saw that he had flung 
her bodily on to what had been a skeleton, but was now 
only a confused heap of brittle bones. 

“I’m sorry,” he said, “but there was no time to 
pick and choose.” 

“It’s a horrible place. Let us go home !” 

“We’ll go at once as soon as we’ve found some coffee 
. . . and I would like another knife or two. . . . Look 
in that chest. Macro has opened it for us. . . . And if 
you find any tobacco. I’ll thank you,” and he rooted 
rapidly through one broken-open seaman’s box, while 
she did the same by another. 

“Tobacco — I think,” she announced presently, . . . 
“and a knife and a tinder-box.” 

“Another knife” was his find. “And we’ll take these 
two coats ” 

“Whatever for.?^” 

“Well — if any of those screaming deevils, as the mate 
calls them, should come after us as we go back, you 
feel them less through a coat than on your bare skin.” 

“I don’t think I’ll come again.” 

“Oh, it’s quite easy to avoid them, you see. And 
they soon go if they find nothing eatable.” 


176 


MAID OF THE MIST 


“Hideous things! . . . Will those cases be coffee?” 

“I think so. . . . We’ll chance one anyway. . . . 
And those small casks are rice. We’re doing famously. 
Is there anything else you would like?” 

“Heaps of things — spoons, forks, plates, stock- 
ings ” 

“Here are stockings ” and he delved into his 

chest again. 

“Truly — but twenty sizes too large. These boxes all 
seem to have belonged to men. Let us get home before 
those awful birds come back.” 

So they returned to the raft and pushed it slowly 
along the pile, from place to place, where the various 
portions of theijr cargo stood awaiting them, and 
Wulfrey wrestled manfully with casks and barrels and 
boxes in a way that would have astonished himself 
mightily three months before. And The Girl, eager 
to help as far as she could — brushing shoulders with 
him as they hauled and lifted, their hands overlapping 
at times, their bare arms in closest contact as they 
struggled with the insensate obstinacy of dead weights, 
• — was very conscious of the play of the corded muscles 
in his arms and back, and the energy and determination 
of the quiet resolute face. And she was at once grate- 
ful and exultant in the knowledge that all the powers 
this man possessed were at her service, and that, if 
occasion should arise, they would be expended for her 
to the uttermost and without hesitation. 

She experienced sensations entirely new to her. She 
found them good. They quickened her blood and stimu- 
lated her mind. She had seen much of men, more per- 
haps than most of her years, but men of a very different 
type, — unmuscular, powdered and peruked and 
befrilled, with airs and graces and velvet coats which 
hid the lack of virility within, and did duty for it to 
the world at large ; men of wealth and highest culture 
and too often of meanest heart, self-seeking, intent only 


MAID OF THE MIST 


177 


on their personal satisfactions, self-forgetful only in 
the pursuit of ignoble ends. 

In every particular so different from this man. She 
had met but very few men whom she felt she could 
trust implicitly. Some of the most apparently sincere 
had proved the least worthy. And they were the most 
dangerous. They drew your trust, and so disarmed 
and then most treacherously betrayed you. Oh, she had 
seen it, time and again, and so her mind had come to 
look on men in general as beasts of prey, to be dreaded, 
and avoided except in the most open and superficial 
fashion. 

But this was a man of another world. She had met 
none like him. He roused her and soothed her as none 
of those others ever had done, as no man before had 
ever done. 

She had seen men as good-looking, perhaps, but in a 
very different way. Would they have looked as well, 
stripped of their trappings She doubted it. And 
never a man among them could or would, she was sure, 
have handled these obdurate barrels and boxes as this 
man did. Truly they seemed to object to removal from 
their lodging-places as though they were endowed with 
minds of their own. 

And she had trusted him implicitly, from the first 
moment she had looked into his eyes, and recognised 
that it must be he who had drawn her back out of 
the closing hand of death. 

“Better put that on,” said Wulfrey, dropping one 
of the coats over her shoulders, when they had got 
everything aboard. 

“Why.?^ I am quite warm.” 

“We have done our work now till we get to the spit. 
No good chilling in the wind. We’re going to sail 
home,” and he slipped on the other jacket, and pro- 
ceeded to rig up a sail and a steering plank as he had 
seen the mate do. 


178 


MAID OF THE MIST 


The Girl broke into a laugh at the change for the 
worse produced in their appearance by the jackets. 

“You looked like a Greek or a Roman before,” she 
said. “Now we both look like gipsy tinkers.” 

“Fine feathers — fine birds he smiled, as they 
hauled out past the end of the pile and began lumber- 
ing slowly homewards. 

“Those awful birds !” and she glanced anxiously 
round for them, but they were busy a mile away and 
troubled them no more. ' 


XXXIII 

The Girl was glad enough of her old coat before they 
reached the spit, in spite of its demoralising effect on 
her appearance, — glad even to snuggle down among 
the blankets, for, after the hard work of loading, even 
the south-west wind began presently to feel cool. 

Then came the discharging, and the transporting of 
their heavy weights to the smaller raft on the lake, 
which could not take more than half their cargo at a 
time. So he took her and a portion across to the 
‘Martha,’ and she undertook to have supper ready by 
the time he got back with the rest. 

And surely she wrought pleasanter thoughts even 
than usual into her cooking that day, for it seemed to 
him, when in due course he sat opposite to her on the 
other side of their fire, that he had never enjoyed a 
meal so much in his life, deficient as it was in many 
things that he had always regarded as needful. 

“We have done a good day’s work,” he said, as he 
lit his pipe at her request. 

“I wonder what he will say about it.” 

“We will not let it trouble us. He has only himself 
to blame.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 179 

“I wonder if you and he would have quarrelled if I 
had never come.” 

“We certainly would if he had taken the line he has 
done. As long as he did his fair share of the providing 
I did not mind. But the position he took up was an 
impossible one.” 

They fell into reminiscent talk of that great outer 
world which seemed so remote, and from which, for all 
they knew, they were now for ever cut off. She had 
many strange recollections of her earlier life in France, 
some very terrible ones of the times of the Red Deluge, 
very mixed ones of the later times in England. 

It was amazing to him to sit in that bare cabin of a 
deserted ship, on an island shunned by all, listening to 
her familiar talk of men and women who had been but 
names to him, until her intimate knowledge of them 
made them into actual living personages. 

Her outlook on life had been very much wider than 
his own. She had lived among the scenes and people 
of whom he had only read in the news-sheets. He was 
immensely interested, both in the things she talked 
about and the way she talked about them. ^ His ques- 
tionings towards a clearer understanding on points 
which were to her matters of simplest elementary knowl- 
edge amused her not a little. And he got many a self- 
revealing glimpse into that strange past life of hers, 
from which she was so contented to escape, but which 
was yet so full of colour and contrast and vivid actual- 
ity that, in spite of all its discrepancies and disillusion- 
ments, it had assumed for her a certain glamour which 
she averred it had never worn at the time. 

“Wait a moment,” he would say, breaking into her 
flow of reminiscence, “ ‘Monsieur’ is ?” 

“The Comte de Provence, the late King’s brother, my 
uncle. My father, the Kind’s next brother, the Comte 
d’Artois, is ‘Monseigneur.’ He has become terribly 
devout since Mme de Polastron died. The abbe Latil 


180 


MAID OF THE MIST 


is his heart and mind and conscience. In his way he 
was fond of me, I believe, but since I came to under- 
stand the wrong he did my mother, I have detested him. 
And I have no doubt he was not sorry when I broke 
away. I was a perpetual reminder, you see ” 

“And there is another Countess d’ Artois.?” 

“Oh, yes, — Marie Therese of Savoy, but she is too 
awful, — a quite impossible woman, one must say that 
much for him. If ever a man had good excuse for 
seeking his pleasures elsewhere, he had. She was ter- 
rible. She had no more moral feeling than a cat.” 

“And Madame Adelaide ? Let me see — who was 

she.?” 

“My great-aunt — poor old thing! Those atrocious 
Narbonnes lived on her and turned her round their 
fingers.” 

“And Madame Elizabeth.? It is terribly confusing.” 

“Not at all. It is all as simple as can be. Madame 
Elizabeth was my aunt, my father’s sister. She was 
very sweet. Poor dear ! They cut off her head, though 
she never harmed a soul since the day she was born. 
She was Very good to me. If she had lived I do not 
think I would be here. She was not like the rest. I 
could have lived happily with her.” 

And so she chattered away, — about the late King — 
her uncle also, — and of the Due d’Orleans, — “always a 
self-seeker, and intriguer, with a very sharp eye on the 
way things might turn to his own benefit. Oh, I am 
glad they took his head off. It was righteous retribu- 
tion.” — ^And of the Queen “She did foolish things 

at times, but she meant no harm, and, mon Dieu, how 
she suffered!” — ^And of Lafayette, and Talleyrand, 
and many and many another. 

And it was indeed passing strange to lie , there listen- 
ing to it all — she clad in her blankets, for the night 
air had a chill in it, and he in the sea-damaged coat 
and small clothes of a gentleman of ‘the Duke of Kent’s 


MAID OF THE MIST 


181 


suite, while between them the thin blue reek of the 
drift-wood fire on its hearth of sand stole up through 
the half-closed companion-hatch to the lonely night 
outside. 

XXXIV 

“We shall have a visit from our next-door neighbour 
presently, I expect,” said Wulfrey, when The Girl came 
out of her cabin next morning. “Will you mind stop- 
ping below while I dispose of him?” 

“But why.?” 

“He puts things coarsely at times, and he will prob^ 
ably be in a very bad humour at having to get his own 
meals ready.” 

“I don’t mind him.” 

“Nor do I, except on your account. But I shall feel 
happier if you are out of sight and hearing.” 

“Oh, very well. But nothing he could say would 
trouble me in the slightest.” 

So, after breakfast, she sat down on the cabin floor 
to her sewing, and he lit his pipe and went up on deck 
carrying his axe. He closed the companion-doors and 
hatch very quietly — but she heard him — and went for- 
ward into the bows, which, since the usual wind blew 
from the south-west, was the nearest point to the ‘Jane 
and Mary.’ 

It was a long time before the mate showed any signs, 
beyond an extra rush of smoke when he made up his 
fire to cook his breakfast. But he came up at last, 
caught sight of Wulfrey, and stood scowling across at 
him for a time. Then he dropped down on to his raft 
and came wobbling, with quick angry strokes, across 
to the ‘Martha.’ 

“So that’s it, is it?” he growled, with a grim look on 
his dark face. 

“That’s it,” said Wulfrey coolly. 


182 


MAID OF THE MIST 


‘‘And you think you’ve got her all to yourself? — 
what you’ve been plotting for ever since I hauled her 
ashore.” 

“Are you speaking of Miss Drummond?” 

“I’m speaking of that girl. ’Twas me hauled her 
ashore an’ she’s my right if she’s anybody’s.” 

“There it is, you see. She is nobody’s right but her 
own. And neither she nor I are your servants, to pre- 
pare your food and see to your comfort while you dig 
treasure out of the wreckage. So we have decided to 
fend for ourselves and you can fend for yourself.” 

“Oh! You think so, do you? We’ll see about 
that.” 

“We undertake not to go aboard your ship if you 
give your word not to come aboard ours.” 

“See you first !” 

“Thank you 1 Then now we know how we stand, and 
will act accordingly.” 

“Ay, now you know.” 

“And will act accordingly,” emphasized Wulfrey 
once more. “I must ask you to keep off,” as the mate 
paddled along side and reached up a rough hairy hand 
to the side. “I’m sorry it’s come to this, but I won’t 
have you on board.” 

“Won’t, eh?” and as he reached up the other hand 
and prepared to mount, Wulfrey picked up his axe and 
held it threateningly above the clinging hands, which 
straightway loosed their hold amid a volley of curses. 

“ you! You’d maim me! 

me, if I don’t pay you for this ! The 

girl’s mine. I found her. I’ll get her over your dead 
body if needs be.” 

“Ah! And who found you? And where would you 
be if I hadn’t helped you on to the raft yon first night ? 
Tell me that, will you? By the same rule you’re mine, 
and all you’ve got is mine.” 

“ you for a 


MAID OF THE MIST 


183 


sea-lawyer!” foamed the mate, his dark face and eyes 
all ablaze, his shaking fists hurling curses beyond the 
compass of his tongue. 

Wulfrey, eyeing him professionally, said to himself, 
“Too much rum. He’ll have D.T. if he doesn’t slack 
off — or a fit if he does much of this kind of thing.” 

The mate thrashed back to his own ship with furious 
strokes and climbed aboard, and Wulfrey, having 
watched him safely up the side, went down to The Girl. 

“He is very angry,” he said quietly. 

“He did not whisper. I couldn’t help hearing him. 
What will he do next.?^” 

“We can only wait and see. We shall have to be on 
our guard, but we won’t let him trouble us. He is 
drinking too much.” 

They saw nothing more of him all that day, not even 
his head above the bulwarks. Wulfrey surmised that 
he was probably treating his wrath with rum, and plot- 
ting mischief, or maybe he was lying dead drunk in his 
cabin. 

They themselves were well provided in all respects, 
but he had good reason to know that stocks across 
there were running low, and that before long the man 
of wrath would have to go abroad to make up his defi- 
ciencies, and that would give them the opportunity of 
getting in fresh water and rabbit-meat. 

He could only hope the mate would not postpone his 
journey too long, for the weather seemed like chang- 
ing. There was no sun visible, not a speck of blue 
sky, but in their place a wan-white opaqueness which 
looked portentous and might mean anything. 

Wulf spent most of the day on the alert, leaving 
the deck only for meals, and popping up even in the 
middle of them to make sure that all was right. But 
Macro made no sign. 

There was no knowing, however, what a furious, 
rum-fuddled man might attempt. His crazy jealously 


184 


MAID OF THE MIST 


and anger might stick at nothing, and Wulfrey looked 
forward to a watchful night as a necessity. 

And, as he paced the deck, he ruminated on the handi- 
cap imposed by virtue on an honest man when fighting 
roguery. Here was Macro at liberty to sleep without 
fear of assault, to go ashore for water and fresh meat, 
and to the wreckage for everything he wanted, assured 
in his own mind that no one would rifle his stores, or 
fire his ship, or play any other dastardly trick, in his 
absence. While they, if they left their stronghold 
unguarded for an hour, must be exposed to all these 
things, and constant watchfulness would be necessary 
to prevent them. 

It was not a pleasant prospect and he did not see 
how it was going to end. At the same time he did not 
see what other course had been left to them, and he 
was determined to go through with this, cost what it 
might. 

The thought of striking down this man with whom 
he had lived in fellowship, even in fair fight, was abhor- 
rent to him. The thought of being struck down himself 
made his blood run cold on The Girl’s account. Both 
possibilities must be avoided if possible. The latter 
at all hazards. If it came to the mate suffering or 
The Girl, the mate would have to go without compunc- 
tion. 

XXXV 

The night passed without disturbance, the morning 
found them swathed in dense white mist which hid one 
side of the ship from the other. 

“He did not come again.?” asked The Girl when they 
met. “I am ashamed to have slept so soundly. I 
intended to take my fair share of the watching.” 

“There was no need. I bolted the doors and slept 
at the foot of the stairs. It’s all cotton-wool outside. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


185 


You can’t see a couple of feet. He won’t venture out 
in that, if I know him. But we need water. I’ll go 
across after breakfast and get some.” 

“I shall come too. I wouldn’t stop here alone for 
anything.” 

“All right. Our only difficulty will be in finding the 
shore and getting back to the ship. Fog is terribly 
bewildering.” 

“If you can find the shore we can get back all right,” 
she said, after thinking it over. 

“How.?” 

“We have that heap of rope you brought over. 
Could we not untwist some and make a cord.? Then if 
we tied one end to the ship and carried the other ashore 
we could feel our way back by it.” 

“It will take a lot of untwisting. We’re quite two 
hundred yards from the shore. But it’s worth trying.” 

So they untwisted rope till their fingers were sore, 
and tied the pieces together till he judged they had 
enough, and presently they embarked noiselessly on 
their raft and paddled in the direction in which he 
believed the shore lay. The Girl paying out the string 
as they went. 

This weird envelopment of dense white mist was a 
new experience for her. She could barely see the 
water a foot or two away. The string slipped through 
her fingers and vanished into the fog-wall. Dale, 
sweeping the water with his oar, loomed dim and large 
just above her. 

They went on and on, but found no shore. 

“The string is nearly all done,” she said at last. 

“Then we’re going wrong,” he whispered. “Don’t 

speak loud, we don’t know how near we may be to ” 

and, as to confirm his fears, a great black bulk ap- 
peared in the clammy white above them, and Wulfrey 
hurriedly checked their way and backed off into the 
•fog again. 


186 


MAID OF THE MIST 


“ ‘The Jane and Mary,’ ” he whispered, when they 
had put a space between them and it. “We’ve been 
circling round. The shore must be this way, I 

think ” and the cord slacked in The Girl’s fingers 

as he struck off to the right, and in due course they 
made the beach with cord to spare. 

They tied the precious guiding-line to the raft and 
set off with their buckets, Wulfrey trailing his oar 
behind him so that by its mark in the sand they might 
grope their way back. In his belt he carried the only 
weapon he possessed, his axe, which, as matters stood 
with the mate, he deemed it advisable always to have 
at hand. 

Keeping along the edge of the lake till he judged 
they were opposite the ponds, they struck inland, and 
managing to keep a straighter course than on the water, 
came at last to their goal. 

They filled their buckets and were returning on their 
trail, bending every now and again to make sure they 
were right, when, with an abruptness that startled the 
buckets out of their hands, a dark figure loomed up 
on them out of the fog and they found themselves face 
to face with the mate. 

He had heard them coming and was ready. Wulfrey 
had barely time to drop his oar and pluck out his axe 
when the other sprang at him with his weapon swung 
up for the blow. 

It was very grim. Of all fighting-tools the axe is the 
most brutal — after, perhaps, the spiked club and the 
scythe-blade tied on a pole, which are only fit for 
savages. It is cumbersome and ungainly. It admits of 
little skill either in attack or defence. Its arguments 
are final and convincing, and its wounds are very 
ghastly. 

The Girl could barely make out which was which, so 
thick was the veiling fog. But that did not matter. 
She sprang in between the two dark figures with arms 


MAID OF THE MIST 


187 


outspread, at imminent risk of receiving both their 
blows, crying, “No! — You shall not! You shall not!” 

The mate hurled oaths at her. She thought he was 
going to strike her down. And past her, at Wulfrey, — 

“ Ye ! It’s like ye. Steal her first, then hide 

behind her !” 

With one big black hand he gripped her blanket 
cloak and whirled her away into the mist, and came 
plunging at Wulfrey, who stood with poised axe and 
eyes that watched his every movement. 

The mate played round him for an opening. Out of 
the corner of his eye he saw The Girl groping about 
for the oar. He rushed into end it with one crushing 
blow. 

But Wulf was ready for hi mand he was the cooler 
man. As the mate’s axe came swooshing down straight 
for his shoulder and neck, his own swung round, caught 
the other full in the blade with its own stout back, and 
with a ringing click sent it flying, with such a shock 
to the arm that had held it that the mate believed it 
was broken. He ducked with an oath and disappeared 
into the fog. 

The Girl came panting up, her face all sanded with 
her fall, her eyes ablaze. “Did it reach you.?” 

“Not at all. I’m all right.” 

“The bruit ! I feared he would kill you.” 

“He did his worst. . . . What were you going to 
do with that.?” — the oar she had picked up. 

“I was going smash him on the head with it, but I 
couldn’t find it /at first.” 

“Two to one!” 

“Two to one !” 

“I don’t care. I’d have killed him if I could.” 

“What about our water.?” 

“It’s all spilled.” 

“We’ll go back for more. He won’t come back. I 
doubt if he’ll find his axe in this fog. Which way now.?” 


188 


MAID OF THE MIST 


and he stood puzzling, for force of circumstance and 
much trampling of the sand had lost them their clue. 
“You cast round that way for the fark of the oar, 
but don’t go far. I’ll try this side. Call if you find.” 

“Here!” she cried, almost at once, and he followed 
her voice into the fog and found her standing on the 
line. 

But so confused were they that even then they had 
not an idea which way to follow it. 

“Which way she asked, staring down at the groove 
under her feet. 

“This, I think. ... I don’t know,” and he stood 
perplexed. “There is nothing for it but following it 
up and seeing where we come to.” 

So they picked up their buckets, and he took the 
oar, and they set off again, — and came out at last, not 
on the green undergrowth which flourished round the 
ponds, but on the bare shore of the lake. 

“Now we know where we are at all events. Dare 
you stop here while I go back.^” 

“No,” she said with a shiver. 

“Come along, then I” and they turned and went back, 
and he discoursed of fogs as they went. “Nothing like 
a fog for absolutely confusing one’s sense of direction. 
I’ve known people wander for hours on a common, 
round and round, quite unable to get anywhere. And 
one soon gets into a panic and common sense goes 
overboard.” 

She had not had much experience of fogs, but ex- 
pressed herself vehemently on the subject, and so they 
came to the ponds, and back, in time, to their raft. 
And Wulfrey was mightily glad to see it again, for 
the idea had been troubling him that Macro might have 
found it, and set it adrift, or gone off to their ship 
to find solace there for his discomfiture ashore. 

“I wonder where he’s got to?” he said anxiously. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


189 

“I don’t care. I wish he’d get lost in the fog and 
never come back.” 

“You feel strongly,” he said, with a smile at her 
vehemence. 

“Yes, I like or I dislike, and both to the full.” 

The guiding-line led them safely home, and glad they 
were to get there, for the chill of the fog and the 
treacheries it held were enough to weigh down the 
staunchest of spirits. 


XXXVI 

Their experiences in the fog had occupied many hours, 
and the unusual strain had left them both somewhat 
lax and weary. By the time they had prepared and 
eaten their much-delayed meal, and were enjoying the 
after-rest, the thick whiteness outside had turned to 
chiller gray, and the comfort of a blazing fire was 
eminently agreeable. 

Wulfrey closed the companion-doors and hatch, all 
except the narrowest crack through which the smoke 
could escape, lit his pipe, and lay at ease, f^^atching 
the many-coloured tongues of the dancing flames and 
The Girl who sat gazing dreamily into them on the 
other side, and wondered how it would have been with 
them all if Macro’s vicious blow had got home on his 
neck. 

She was very good to look upon as she sat there in 
cabin into a Temple of Youth and Beauty, 
the flickering half-darkness. The gracious curves of 
her supple young figure transformed the bare little 

The dusky glamour of her hair, the shadowy beauty 
of her dark soft eyes, the level brows and wide white 
forehead which gave such strength and dignity to her 
face — they all held for him an arrest and an appeal 
such as he had never before experienced. 

She had made herself a robe out of a piece of the 


190 


MAID OF THE MIST 


crimson silk they had brought over from the pile. It 
was hardly a dress, for it swathed about her in flow- 
ing folds rather than fitted to her. But he thought he 
had never seen so becoming a garment. It was sheer 
delight to lie and look at her. 

But it was a sufficiently difficult problem that faced 
him. In his present state of mind, the mate seemed 
determined to make an end of him the first chance that 
offered. Was there any reasonable hope of a change 
for the better in him.?^ Were they to live in a perpetual 
state of defence till one of them went under — all the 
advantages of unscrupulous attack being left to the 
enemy. Was it reasonable.? If not, what was to be 
done, and how.? 

The man had suddenly become a deadly menace. He 
was no better, in his unprincipled cravings, than a wild 
beast. If that girl fell helpless into his coarse hands. 
. . . And she knew it and looked to him for protection. 

And protection to the utmost of his powers she should 
have. . . . Was he justified in slaying the man.? . . . 
In view of the deadly intent of this latest attack he 
thought he was. But whether he could bring himself 
to it, if the chance offered, he was not by any means 
sure. . . . The deliberate killing of one’s fellow was a 
serious matter. ... In self-defense of course one was 
justified. ... As to the law — it seemed as though the 
mate was right in his belief that they were destined to 
spend the rest of their lives — some of them at all events 
— on this bare bank of sand, where none ever came who 
could help it, and where no law but that of Nature 
obtained. . . . But there was a higher law. “Thou 
shalt not kill.” . . . Yes, it would be very much against 
the grain of his life and conscience, but it might have 
to be. ... 

He sat up suddenly, listening intently. 

“What is it.?” asked The Girl, startled out of her 
own reverie. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


191 


He raised his hand for silence. 

“I thought I heard a cry,” and he got up, and went 
up the steps, and opened the door and stood there 
straining his ears into the clammy darkness. The fog 
lay thicker than ever. It was like listening into the 
side of a bale of raw cotton. The faint glow of the 
fire below died against the opaque wall in front. It 
could not have been seen a yard away. 

The Girl stood on the stairs close behind him. 

“I must have been mistaken,” he murmured, ‘or per- 
haps it was a seagull,” — when, just below and almost 
alongside them, there came the violent sweep of an oar 
used as a paddle, and a wild spate of curses like the 
furious outburst of a panic-stricken brain. 

Wulf slipped noiselessly down for his axe and stepped 
up on deck. If he went past, well and good. If he 
ran into them 

There came a sudden bump against the side of their 
ship and the sound of a fall on the raft. 

“ ye, ye rotten old 

coffin ! I’ve got ye at last, !” and right 

up out of the fog under Wulfrey’s nose came two 
clammy black hands clawing nervously at the bul- 
wark. 

“You can’t come aboard here. Macro,” he said 
quietly. The grimy hands loosed with a startled oath 
and the mate dropped back on to his raft. 

“ ! That you again .P 

you! I thought. . . . Then my craft must 

be over there. ! I’ll do for you yet, 

my cully I” and the oar dashed into the water again 
and he cursed himself off into the darkness. 

“You could have killed him,” gasped The Girl at 
his side, through her chattering teeth. 

“I could — but I couldn’t.” 

“We shall have no peace while he lives.” 

“I fear not. Still — I couldn’t cut him down in cold 


192 


MAID OF THE MIST 


blood like that. What would you have thought of me 
if I had done so.^” 

“I should have said you had done well.” 

“I know you better.” 

At which she shook her head. “You don’t know what 
horrid thoughts whirl about in my mind. No man 
really knows what a woman thinks,” and the frank 
dark eyes regarded him solemnly. 

“I know you better than you do yourself.” 

“I doubt it,” with another shake of the head. “But, 
even then, it might have been best,” — with a shiver — 
“It sounds horrible — but ” 

He could understand all her feeling in the matter. 
In her place he would have felt just the same. The 
man was a hideous menace — to her especially — and 
there would be no security for them while he lived. But 
all the same. . . . 

“Let us get back to the fire,” he said quietly. “He 
won’t come back tonight. Poor wretch, he’s probably 
been paddling about all day looking for his ship and 
he’s half crazed with it.” 

“I don’t think I am bloodthirsty by nature,” she said, 
with her hands pressed tight to her eyes, when she had 
sunk down before the fire again. “But I fear that man 
with all my soul, both for myself and you. He will kill 
you if he gets the chance. If he kills you I shall kill 
myself. It is better that one should die than two.” 

“I agree, but I don’t want to have the killing of 
him if I can help it.” 

“Killing is horrible,” and she shivered again, “But 
being killed is worse . . . and to fall into the hands of 
a man like that would be even worse still. What will 
be the end of it all.?” 

But that was beyond him, and their hearts were 
heavy over it. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


193 


XXXVII 

“Is it often like this?” asked The Girl depressedly, on 
the third day of mist. 

“I’m afraid there’s a good deal of it. We’ve had it 
three or four times since we came. It may be worse in 
the winter.” 

“I wish we could get away.” 

“I wish so too, but I don’t see how we’re to manage 
it. . . unless, sometime, a boat washes ashore among 
the wreckage. And even then . . . without Macro to 
manage it . . .” and he shook his head unhopefully. 
“ ... In the meantime I count it marvellous gain 
that you should have come ” 

And at that it was her turn to shake her head. “I 
don’t know. I seem to have brought more harm than 
good.” 

“It has made all the difference in the world.” 

“Yes, it has set you two by the ears and put you 
in peril of your life. That is not a good work.” 

“Your company more than compensates. Besides, 
we should probably have got to loggerheads in any 
case, and without anything like so good a reason.” 

“It would have been better, I think, if you had let me 
go when I was so nearly gone, and not rubbed me back 
to life.” 

“I thank God that you came,” he said weightily. 
“Without you we might have sunk into savages, caring 
only for the lower things. You lift me without know- 
ing it.” 

“You couldn’t sink into a savage. He is one nat- 
urally. And I am becoming one, for I am all the time 
wishing he were dead.” 

“He must be having a bad time, unless he brought 
over provisions that last time, and I doubt if he did. 


194 


MAID OF THE MIST 


He’s probably living chiefly on rum. And that won’t 
bring him to any better frame of mind, I’m afraid.” 

“To think,” she mused, “that three people cannot 
live on an island big enough to hold thousands, without 
quarrelling to the death !” 

“The trouble is not of our making, so we need not 
blame ourselves.” 

“Yes, it is. I began it by coming ashore. You ought 
to have let me stop out there ” 

“You are very much better here.” 

“ And you continued it hy bringing me back to 

life. You ought to have let me die.” 

“Very well. I accept all the blame and rejoice in it,” 
he said, with a smile. “It is just the fog getting into 
you. You’ll feel differently about it when the sun 
comes out again.” 

“Sun.f^ I don’t believe we are going to see it again. 
I don’t believe it ever shines here or ever has done since 
the world began. It is an island of mist . . . and we 
are just vapours ” 

“Macro’s not anyway. I wish he were. He wouldn’t 
trouble me in the slightest then. He’s a solid strong 
mixture of Spanish buccaneer and Highland robber, 
with a touch of volcano to keep the mixture boiling.” 

But the chill of the mist was upon her and nothing 
he could say availed to cheer her. So he hauled out 
the rolls of silk they had brought over, and set to 
work decorating the cabin with them, and interested her 
out of her depression by the purposed mistakes he 
made. 

It was the ravelling off of a long thread from one of 
the pieces of silk he was cutting, that showed him the 
way to a new employment for her and the possibilities 
of a welcome addition to their meagre larder. 

“Do you think you could twist two or three of these 
into a fishing-line?” he asked her. “I’ve seen heaps of 
fish in the lake. We might try for some.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


195 


‘‘And hooks?” 

“If you could spare me one of your big needles I 
think I could make something that might do.” 

She went at once and got him one, and then set to 
work on the line, and he could hardly get on with his 
own job for watching her. 

She was so eminently graceful in all her movements. 
Her tall slender figure, supple, shapely, and all softly 
rounded curves without a discoverable abruptness or 
angularity anywhere about it, lent itself with singular 
charm to her present occupation. After thoughtful 
consideration of the matter, she unrolled one of the 
pieces of silk the whole width of the cabin, then pick- 
ing out a thread, she fastened the end of it to the wood- 
work and travelled along the side of the piece, bending 
and releasing it as she went. The same with two more 
threads. 

“Three ply will be strong enough she asked, 
straightening up and looking across at him. 

“Let me see what three ply feel like,” and he went 
across and watched her while she twisted the threads 
tightly together with deft soft fingers. 

“I should think that would do,” he said, running it 
between his finger and thumb. Their hands met, and 
the touch of hers sent a quite unexpected thrill of 
physical delight tingling through his veins. He did not 
dare to look full at her for the moment, lest she should 
see it in his eyes. But he was conscious to the point of 
pain of her close proximity, — somehow conscious too 
— and that quite unconsciously and without any any 
reasoning on the matter — that, in the twinkling of an 
eye, she was no longer simply a beautiful and charming 
girl, but had become for him the most beautiful and 
charming girl in all the world. 

His heart felt suddenly too big for his body. He 
could have taken her in his arms then and there, and 
crushed her to him, and smothered her with hot kisses. 


196 


MAID OF THE MIST 


And he could no more have done it than he could have 
brained her with his axe. For she trusted him implic- 
itly, and he was himself. 

He took a deep breath to give his heart more room, 
and bent to examine her twist. 

“It will do splendidly,” he said, and she glanced 
quickly at him and wondered what had made that 
curious change in his voice. “How will you keep it 
rolled tight like that.^^” 

“I’ve been thinking. If I greased my fingers with 
some of that pork fat as I roll it, and roll it very tight, 
it will probably keep so. How long will you want it?’’ 

“As long as you can make it without too much 
trouble.” 

“I can make it the full length of that silk as far as 
I can see.” 

“That will do admirably. ... If I can make as good 
a hook as you have made a line we will have fish for 
dinner,” and he went back to the fire, where, with his 
axe and his knife and two rusty nails lashed together 
at the top to act as tweezers, he was endeavouring to 
bend a portion of her needle into a hook. 

At the cost of some burns and cuts he managed at 
last to make something distantly resembling one. 

“It looks horrid,” said The Girl when he showed it 
to her. “I shall be sorry for the fishes if they get that 
into them.” 

“So shall I. But we’ll not let them suffer long if 
they give us the chance.” 

She was eager as a child with a new toy to put 
their work to the test. So he cut some small pieces of 
pork and embedded his hook in one, and dropped it into 
the bed of mist over the side. 

And she leaned over, with her shoulder unconsciously 
against his, — but he felt it, and rejoiced in the feel as 
keenly as ever Macro did in his treasure-trove — and 
peered anxiously down at the line, of which she could 


MAID OF THE MIST 197 

see but a couple of feet, and waited impatiently for 
results. 

He put it into her hand, saying, 

“If anything comes of it you shall have the honour 
of catching our first fish,” but he held on to the slack 
behind. 

“It’s jerking,” she whispered breathlessly, “Oh, I’m 
sure there’s something on it . . and as she let go 
the line he gave it a jerk on his own account, then drew 
it quickly and a plump astonished fish lay jumping and 
twisting on the deck. It was over a foot in length, 
very prettily coloured, dark blue with many cross- 
streaks and silvery below. 

“Mackerel, I think,” he said, and promptly knocked 
it on the head, to end its troubles and allow him the 
further use of his hook. 

“The poor little thing! I’m so sorry,” she said, 
looking mournfully down at the iridescent beauty. “I 
don’t think I like fishing.” 

“You’ll think better of it when it’s fried.” 

“I couldn’t touch it,” with a vigorous shake of the 
head. 

So he asked her to go down and make some cakes, 
and then caught another fish of a different kind the 
moment the bait reached the water, and a couple more 
for breakfast next day, and was thereby much reas- 
sured as to the future of their larder. He cleaned 
two of his fish and fried them with some port fat as 
soon as she had made her cakes, and proceeded to rea- 
son her out of her prejudice. 

“You have eaten fish all your life, haven’t you?” he 
asked. 

“Ye-es.” 

“Well, every fish has had to be caught before you 
could eat it. They generally leave them to die. But 
even that is probably only similar to our drowning. 


198 MAID OF THE MIST 

which is said to be about as pleasant a way as there 
is of going.” 

“It’s horribly cold if you’re lashed to a mast,” — 
with a reminiscent shiver. “And being rubbed back to 
life is just as bad.” 

“And we are more merciful, because we kill them at 
once.” 

“It’s horrible to think that everything we eat, except 
things that grow of course, has got to suffer death for 
us.” 

‘But you have always eaten these things without 
being troubled about it.” 

“The killing has never been brought home to me so 
closely before.” 

“It’s Nature’s law, you see. Everything feeds on 
something else. These fishes feed on smaller things. 
And how do you know that when you cut a cabbage 
or a potato ” 

“How I wish I had the chance!” 

“So do I, most heartily. But how do you know they 
don’t feel it just as much, in their own dull way, as 
the pig did from which we get our pork?” 

She shook her head and sighed. “We can’t get away 
from it, I suppose,” and tasted the fish and found it 
good, and ate quite heartily though with an appearance 
of protest. 

“You see,” he said. “Some fishes lay millions of 
eggs at a time. If they all grew up the sea would be 
choked with them, as the earth would be with animals 
if they weren’t killed off. Besides, unless I am mistaken 
in my recollection of our old parson’s reading, all these 
things were expressly provided for man’s sustenance, so 
we are only doing our duty in eating them.” 

“All the same, I think I will let you do all the catch- 
ing and killing.” 

“Of course. That is the man’s proper part in the 
family economy. He is the bread-and-meat winner. And 


MAID OF THE MIST 


1 199 


the wife’s — the woman’s, I mean — is to see to the cook- 
ing” and he occupied himself busily with fish-bones, and 
felt like biting his tongue off for its involuntary slip. 

“If you had lived on pork and rabbits for months 
you would find this fish delicious,” he said presently, to 
break the odd little silence that had fallen on them. 

“It is very good. I wonder you never caught any 
before.” 

“I did try, but my tackle was too rough. The fish 
would have none of it. It is your clever line that has 
done the trick.” 

“I am glad to be of some use, though I can’t help 
being sorry for the fish.” 

And if he had dared he would have delighted to tell 
her of what infinitely greater use she was to him in 
other and higher ways. 


XXXVIII 

WuLFREY was awakened in the night by the sounds he 
had come to recognise as the accompaniments of bad 
weather. The ship was humming in the wind and strain- 
ing and jerking restively at the rusty cable which he 
was always expecting to give way. He wondered sleep- 
ily what would happen to them if it did. Wondered 
also if The Girl was frightened at the changed condi- 
tions, or whether she would understand. He slipped on 
some clothes and went into the cabin, to reassure her 
if necessary. 

The fire was a bed of white ashes and a rose-gold core 
in the centre. He piled on some chips and the flames 
broke out with a cheerful crackle. The door of The 
Girl’s little passage way opened an inch or two, and 
he caught a glimpse of her startled eyes shining in the 
fire-light. 


200 MAID OF THE MIST 

“I was afraid you might be disturbed by the storm,” 
he said. 

She went back for a moment, and then came out 
with her blanket skirt and cloak swathed about her, 
and sat down by the fire. 

“It woke me, and I cannot get to sleep again. Oh 
. . . what is that.?” — as a shrill scream pealed out just 
above the opening in the companion-hatch. 

“It’s only those infernal birds. They always come 
screeching round us in bad weather.” 

“I had just been dreaming that that horrid man came 
across in the night and murdered us both. It was such 
a relief to see you alive again.” 

“No fear of his venturing out in this weather. Those 
screaming birds get on his nerves. He’ll be sitting 
drinking, and cursing them in the most awful Gaelic 
he can twist his tongue to. This weather will probably 
last a couple of days. Then it will slack up, and just 
when you’re thinking it’s all gone it will come back 

worse than ever. Fortunately we’ve got By Jove !” 

— and he ran hastily up the companion, unbolted the 
door and ran out on deck. The gale came whuffling 
down on the fire and scattered the white ashes in a 
cloud, and set the silken drapery of the walls rustling 
wildly. The shrill clamour of the birds sounded very 
close, and The Girl sat anxiously wondering. 

He came back in a minute, empty-handed and dis- 
consolate. “I just remembered my fish. I left two up 
there for breakfast, but the birds have had them. 
They’re as thick on the deck as bees on a comb, hoping 
for more.” 

“Is that all? I was afraid that man was coming 
and you’d heard him.” 

“It means living on pork till the storm passes.” 

“That is nothing. We shall enjoy the other things 
all the more later on.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


201 


“I’m wondering all the time how Macro is getting 
on ” he said, pulling out his pipe and filling it. 

“Why trouble about him.? He would not trouble 
about us if we were starving.” 

“I don’t suppose he would. ... I suppose it comes 
of my being so in the habit of helping people through 
their bodily troubles.” 

“It is wasted on him. He would not let you help 
him if you could.” 

“I don’t believe he would, unless he were helpless. 
... I wish he’d never come ashore.” 

“But in that case I would not be here either, and 
you would have been all alone for the rest of your 
life.” 

“Then, after all, I’m glad he came ashore.” 

“I wonder if you would have gone mad in time with 
the loneliness of it,” she said musingly. 

“It would be horrible to be all alone for all the rest 
of one’s life, but I don’t think I would have gone mad. 
I’ve no doubt there are books to be found among the 
wreckage out there. Still . . . for the rest of one’s 
life !” — and he shook his head doubtfully. “As things 
are, however. . . .” 

“As things are.?” she queried, after waiting for him 
to finish. 

“As things are, I am quite content to stop here for 
the rest of my life, if that has to be. But that won’t 
stop my doing my best to get away if the chance offers. 
. . . And you.?” 

“If we were delivered from that man I could be con- 
tent here also. . . . But I do not say for all my life. 
That sounds terribly long. . . . But for that man it 
would be a welcome retreat from a world of which I 
had had a surfeit.” 

He wondered much if she were heart-whole. It 
seemed almost incredible to him that she could have 
lived that strange life of hers without some man want- 


202 


MAID OF THE MIST 


ing and touching it. So fair a prize, to go wholly 
unclaimed and undesired! But never, in all her talk, 
had she said one word that pointed to anything of the 
kind. Rather had she held up the men she had met 
to derogation and contempt. Surely, if there had been 
anyone to whom her heart turned and clung, some evi- 
dence of it would have shown itself. 

From all she had said, from all her little unconscious 
self-revelations, and the wholesome judgment he had 
formed of her in his own mind, he could well believe 
that, in that whirlpool of a world in which she had lived, 
she had come to hold most men in doubt and all at 
arm’s length. And the thought was agreeable to him. 

When the slow day broke, dim and clangorous with 
the gale, they dallied over a meal, talking of many 
things to pass the time, and then went up on deck, and 
with a brandished stick he ridded the ship of the clus- 
tering birds. They shrieked threateningly and came 
swooping at him on the wings of the wind, with hungry 
beaks and merciless eyes. But here he was at home 
and would not suffer their invasion, and finally they 
gave it up and fled to the sandhills, cursing him shrilly 
as they went. 

‘‘Oh, there’s one gone downstairs,” cried The Girl; 
and running down after it, he found a great black 
cormorant squawking fearfully round the cabin and 
dashing itself against the walls in its wild attempts at 
escape. At sight of him it grew frantic, but finally 
found its way out of the hatch- again, almost upsetting 
The Girl in its passage, and then tore away to tell its 
fellows of the awful place it had been in, which smelt 
so good but was so much easier to get into than out 
of. Wulfrey had to open one of the lee ports and 
let the gale blow through to get rid of the smell of it, 
and then he went up again to The Girl. 

They watched the great rollers thundering on the 
beach beyond the spit, rocketing their white spume 


MAID OF THE MIST 


203 


high into the grim black sky, and lashing over at times 
into the lake. And when he called to her to look the 
other way she watched with amazement sandhills of size 
melt away before her eyes and re-form themselves in 
quite different places. 

“But it is past words !” she cried into his ear. 

They stared long too at the ‘Jane and Mary’ of 
Boston, but saw no sign of life aboard of her except 
the birds that clustered there unmolested. 

“It is a most amazing place,” she said, when they 
went down again, as she dusted the saltness out of 
her hair with her hand. “Is it often like this.?” 

“Very often in the winter, I should fear. We’ve had 
our best weather since you came.” 

“I don’t think I want to live all my life here,” she 
said dejectedly. “I love the sun.” 

And he would dearly have liked to tell her that he 
did the same, but that for him she made more sunshine 
even than the sun itself. 

Instead, he prosaically set her to the making of 
more fishing-lines, in case of accident to the one they 
had, and he himself hammered away at more hooks, 
burning and ragging his fingers out of knowledge, but 
producing hooks of a kind somehow. 

XXXIX 

The gale slackened on the third day, and Wulfrey was 
actually relieved in his mind at the sight of Macro 
hurrying ashore on his raft, after fresh meat, and, from 
the fact of his buckets, water, which he had probably 
been too careless, or too drunk, to secure during the 
storm. For the thought of his possibly lying there 
alone and foodless had not been a pleasant one, good 
reason as he had for disliking the man. 

For themselves, he baited and cast his hooks, and 


204 


MAID OF THE MIST 


landed half a dozen fish as fast as he could haul them 
out. Their fresh meat supply would have to wait until 
Macro went out to the wreckage and their minds could 
be at ease as to the safety of their headquarters. The 
sea outside was still too high for any possibility of his 
going that day, and fortunately, thanks to their new 
source of supply, they could wait with equanimity. 
Water they had caught in plenty in the buckets slung 
under the scuppers. 

“He’s alive at any rate,” said Wulfrey, when he went 
down to breakfast. 

“So much the worse for us,” said The Girl. 

“He’s been fasting, I should say, by the way he has 
gone off after rabbits. We ate our first ones raw, I 
remember.” 

“Savages !” 

“Savage with hunger. We had had nothing to eat 
but shell-fish and sea-weed for days.” 

“Horrible ! — raw rabbit and sea-weed !” 

“We had no means of making fire, no shelter. We 
slept out on the sands, and were glad to be simply 
alive. 

“I’m truly thankful you had risen to a higher state 
before I came.” 

“So am I. We were not good to look at. We were 
as men who had died out there among the dead ships’ 
bones and been born again on this sandbank, lacking 
everything. Fortunately for us the years that had 
gone before had been unconsciously making provision 
for us, and here were houses ready-made and waiting; 
and out there more than we could use in a lifetime.” 

They saw the mate return after a time with his 
supplies, and he never showed head again all day. 
Wulfrey let The Girl keep a look-out, and tried him- 
self to get some sleep, in anticipation of the night- 
watch which he saw would be necessary. 

“He will probably go out to the pile tomorrow,” he 


MAID OF THE MIST 


205 


said. “He must be out of flour and probably of rum. 
Then we can take a run ashore ourselves. When he 
gets back he will probably be too tired to be up to 
any mischief.” 

“I wish he would tame down and let us have peace, 
or else go and get himself killed,” she said anxiously. 
“We can’t go on like this for ever.” 

“I’m afraid he won’t oblige us either way. We can 
only hang on and hope for the best, and keep our 
eyes open.” 

His watch that night passed undisturbed. In the 
morning, as he expected. Macro set off for the wreck- 
age ; and, taking some food with them, they went ashore 
for a long day’s ramble. 

“It is good to feel the width of land under one again,” 
said The Girl, fairly dancing with delight. “I am 
very grateful for the ship, but truly it is small and 
cramping.” 

“Sandhills are good for play-time, but you’d miss 
the ship when bed-time came. It’s cold work sleeping 
on the sand.” 

“Almost as bad as sleeping on a broken mast. Which 
way shall we go? You are quite sure he has gone to 
the wreckage?” 

“Quite sure. I watched him out of sight. Besides, 
I am sure he had to go.” 

“Then let us go the opposite way, as far as we can, 
and we’ll stop out all day long and hehave like chil- 
dren. I’m going to walk in the water,” and she kicked 
off her shoes and lifted her blanket skirt and tripped 
along in the lip of the tide, and he did the same, enjoy- 
ing her enjoyment. 

A watery sun shone feebly through a thin gray sky, 
the air was still heavy with moisture, the water in 
which they were walking was warmer than that of the 
lake. On that side, the island curved like the concave 
side of a great half-moon. The pale yellow sand 


206 MAID OF THE MIST 

stretched on and on as far as their eyes could reach. 

“I would like to bathe,” said she exuberantly. 

“Wait till we get beyond the end of our lake, then 
you can take this side and I’ll go across to the other. 
You won’t go out too far? There may be under-cur- 
rents that would carry you out.” 

“I’ll be very careful. And you must not come back 
for an hour. . . . Oh, what are those? . . . Dead 
men.?” 

In a tiny dent in the long sweep of the curve, made 
by the sandhills running almost down to the water, 
were half a dozen dark objects lying on the dry sand 
and looking for all the world like dead bodies. He had 
never seen any jetsam of size on that side. The drive 
of the storms and drift of the currents landed every- 
thing on the western spits and banks. Still there was 
no knowing. 

“Wait here!” he said, and set off towards them. And 
she followed close at his heels. 

But before they had gone many paces, one of the 
bodies set itself suddenly in motion and began to shuf- 
fle towards the water. 

“Seals,” said Wulf, who had never set eyes on a live 
one in his life, but had a general idea of what they 
were like. 

Before they could reach them, all had flopped away 
except one, which, when they drew near, raised its head 
and eyed them piteously and made an effort to rise. 

“It is sick or wounded,” said Wulf. “Poor beast! 

Its ey.es are like a woman’s in ” He bethought 

himself and bit it off short. He had seen just such a 
look in many a woman’s eyes. 

“We won’t disturb her,” he said, and led the way 
round to give her wide berth. 

“Oh — look! Oh, the little darling! How I would 
love to cuddle it!” whispered The Girl, for there, on 


MAID OF THE MIST 


207 


the other side of Mrs Seal, with her front fins clasping 
it protectingly, was a late-born baby sucking away for 
dear life. 

The Girl’s face was transfigured, — ablaze with in- 
tensest sympathy and the wonderful light of mother- 
love. The mother’s eyes followed them anxiously, the 
fear in them died out as they backed slowly away, and 
she bent her head to her baby and seemed to say, 
“Thank you so much! You understand, and I am very 
grateful to you.” 

“I am so glad we saw them. I like the island better 
than ever I did before,” said The Girl. “What a dear 
little thing it was! And she was just delightful,” and 
all day long she kept referring to them and to her joy 
at the sight of them. 

They went on again, mile after mile, and whenever he 
glanced at her, her face was still alight with happiness, 
and unconscious smiles rippled over it in tune with her 
thoughts. So inborn and unfailing is the mother-feel- 
ing in all true, women. 

“Now, if you wish to bathe, here is a good place. I 
will strike across to the other shore and will come back 
in about an hour. Don’t go too far out !” and he strode 
away across the hummocks. 

Under cover of the nearest sandhill she loosed her 
slender garments, and sped like a sunbeam across the 
beach and into the water; and her face, as it came up 
from the kiss of the sea, was like a sweet blush-rose 
all beaded with morning dew, than which no fairer thing 
will you find. And as she swam and dived and splashed 
in the lucent green water, like a lovely white seal, her 
bodily enjoyment and her mental exhilaration flung 
wide her arms at times, as though she would clasp all 
Nature’s joys to her white breast, and her eyes shone 
with a brighter light than had the mother-seal’s, and a 
seal’s eyes are deeply, beautifully tender and bright. 

She laughed aloud at times, though none but herself 


208 


MAID OF THE MIST 


could hear it, in the pure physical joy of living and 
being so very much alive. She was happier than she 
had ever been in all her life before. And one time, as 
she lay afloat with her ams outspread, she looked up at 
the pale sun in the thin gray sky, and all inconse- 
quently said, “Yes — he is good. He is good. He is 
good,” and her face was golden-rosier than ever when 
she was conscious that she had said it aloud. 

She was sitting in the side of the sandhill, combing 
her hair with her fingers, when she heard his distant 
hail. And she climbed the hill and waved to him that 
he might come. 

“I don’t need to ask if you enjoyed your bathe,” he 
said, as he came up. “I can see it in your face.” 

“It was delightful. I would like to bathe every day.” 

“Two days ago?” he laughed. 

“No, days like this. Oh, it was so good! And now I 
am hungry. Let us eat.” 

So they sat in the wire grass of the hill-top and ate 
their frugal meal, she with her wonderful hair all 
astream, the ends spread wide to dry on the sand; and 
he, clean, and strong, and brown, as fine a figure of 
a man as she had ever met, though his raiment was 
nothing to boast of. And he said to himself, “She is 
the most wonderful girl I have ever seen. I would like 
to kiss her hair, her hands, her feet.” 

And she, to herself, — “he is good. He is good. He 
is good.” 

And, buried deep in both their minds, yet fully alive, 
was the thought that it might be that all their lives 
would have to be passed on that lean bank of sand — 
together. 

XL 

On their way back, Wulf lingered behind for a moment 
or two and came along presently with rabbits enough 


MAID OF THE MIST 209 

for their requirements, but did not obtrude them on 
her notice. 

“It has been a day of delight,” she said, as they drew 
to their ship. “Let us do it again. ... I wonder if 
that man has got home.” 

“Not yet. I can see his raft on the spit. Just as 
well we’re here before him.” 

“If only he were not here at all ” 

“Even the original Paradise had its serpent.” 

“This one cannot beguile this woman at all events.” 

It was almost dark when they saw Macro’s laden 
raft lumbering slowly across to the ‘Jane and Mary.’ 

“He won’t starve,” commented The Girl. 

‘Nor go dry. I see at least half a dozen kegs there. 
He’s making provision for bad weather. The gale may 
blow up again during the night. See the birds whirling 
about over there.” 

“Will you have to watch again.?” 

“Safer so, though the chances are the kegs will keep 
him quiet for a time. He’s probably been on short 
allowance the last day or two.” 

“It is monstrous that you should have to. I wish 

” and the petulant stamp of her stout little brogue 

conveyed no suggestion of a blessing. 

“Time may work for us,” he said quietly. “He is our 
thorn in the flesh ” 

“He’s a whole axe if you give him the chance.” 

“I won’t, I promise you. I cannot afford to give 
him any chances,” and she knew that in that his 
thought was wholly for her. 

Wulf dutifully patrolled his deck when it grew dark, 
though he acknowledged to himself that the precau- 
tion was probably unnecessary, for this night at all 
events. Still, he was there to protect The Girl and 
he would suffer no risks. 

It was possibly the distant sight of him, tramping 
doggedly to and fro in the wan moonlight, that set 


210 


MAID OF THE MIST 


Macro’s rum-heated passions on fire. Wulf heard him 
spating curses as he tumbled over on to his raft and 
came splashing across. He went quietly to the com- 
panion-way and closed the door, then picked up his 
axe and stood waiting, with a somewhat quickened heart 
at the thought that the next few minutes might end 
the matter one way or the other. 

“ you, you white-livered skunk ! 

Come out and fight for her like a man if you want her,” 
was the mate’s rough challenge, supplemented by a 
broadside of oaths, as he drew near. 

Wulf stood looking quietly down at him. Words 
were sheer waste. 

“D’ye hear me.? Come down an’ fight it out like Sk 

man, an’ best man takes her, 

you !” 

He bumped roughly against the side and picked up 
his axe. Curses foamed out of him in a ceaseless tor- 
rent, and he made as though he would come swarming 
over. 

“Keep off,” said Wulf. “If you try to come aboard 
I’ll cut you down.” 

“Come down then and fight it out if you’re half a 

man, you! What right have you 

to her, I’d like to know, 1” 

— he picked up his oar and whirled it round at Wulf’s 
head and it splintered on the hard-wood rail. 

“Get back to your ship, man, and don’t make a fool 
of yourself,” said Wulf. ‘I won’t fight you. If you 
try to come on board here I’ll make an end of you.” 

“Ye skunk, ye! Ye white-livered 

cowardly skunk !”-^tc. etc. etc. — to all of which Wulf 
made no reply, which provoked the furious one more 
than any words he could have flung at him. 

He remained there, hurling abuse and invective at 
the steady-faced man up above, till the night air cooled 
the boiling in his brain. Then he seized his splntered 


MAID OF THE MIST 


211 


oar and thrashed away home. Wulf quietly resumed 
his sentry-go, watched till all was quiet on the ‘Jane 
and Mary,’ and then went down. 

To his surprise The Girl was sitting by the fire. He 
had supposed her in bed, had hoped she was fast asleep 
and had heard nothing of the bombardment. 

“He has gone.^” she asked. 

“Yes, he has gone home to bed. I was hoping you 
were asleep.” 

“Asleep! . . . And you did not kill him?” 

“He gave me no chance. He invited me on to his 
raft for a fight ” 

“I heard it all.” 

“I’m sorry. Fie is hardly suitable for a lady’s ears.” 

“I feel myself a terrible burden to you.” 

“But you are not. Very much the reverse. You are 

” he began impulsively, and stopped short. It was 

too soon to tell all that she was to him. 

“I am a bone of contention. I bring you in peril 
of your life ” 

“And I thank God I am here to protect you. Now, 
take my advice and go to bed. I will bring my blankets 
and lie at the foot of the stairs here.” 

XLI 

The next day passed without any sign of the mate, 
beyond the thin blue smoke that floated up from his 
hatchway. 

Wulf surmised that he was making up his leeway in 
the matter of food and drink, and would probably not 
be over-eager for battle for the time being. Never- 
theless he relaxed no whit of his vigilance, and after 
watching on deck for half the night slept the rest at 
the foot of the companion-way as before. 


212 


MAID OF THE MIST 


Contrary to his expectations, the gale did not work 
itself up again, but the sky was still low and dark and 
full of thin smoky clouds hurrying along towards the 
north-east, and he was not at all sure that they had 
done with it yet. 

On the following day, to their great satisfaction. 
Macro set off early for the wreckage, and when they 
had watched him out of sight they went ashore for a 
ramble, and to get water and fresh meat. 

The Girl must of course make straight for the place 
where they had met Mrs Seal and her baby, but, to 
her great disappointment, there was not a sign of 
them. 

“And I did so want to see them again,” said she. 
“She would have known us by this time and not been 
afraid. Perhaps she would even have let me touch it.” 

“They are much happier in the water,” he said, with 
a smile, for her face made him think of a child who had 
lost its toy. 

She would not be satisfied till they had searched far 
along the shore, but nothing came of it, and she was 
disconsolate. The day was not cheerful and she would 
not bathe. They filled their buckets, and he caught 
some rabbits and they returned early to the ship. 

Her humours appealed to him, even though he could 
not possibly understand them completely. Everything 
she did, and the way she did it, and indeed everything 
connected with her, was coming to have a vital interest 
for him. 

He could not know how the anguished fear in that 
mother-seal’s eyes had touched her heart, how she had 
yearned to pick up that sleek little baby and fondle it 
in her arms, how she had been hoping and longing to see 
them again, how great her disappointment had been. 
She felt bereft and went off early to bed. 

Wulf lay smoking and thinking till night fell, and 
then went up to do sentry. He paced the deck till mid- 


MAID OF THE MIST 


213 


night, saw no sign of movement aboard the ‘Jane and 
Mary,’ and went below and was soon sound asleep. 

He woke once with a start, believing he had heard a 
footstep. Then a ripple clop-clopped against the side 
of the ship and he lay down again satisfied. 

He was awakened again by a hand gripping his 
shoulder, and, starting up, found a ghostly white figure 
bending over him, and The Girl’s voice in his ear. 

“There is something wrong. Can you not smell it.f^” 

For a moment he imagined her dreaming. Then his 
nose warned him that she was right. There was some- 
thing unusual in the atmosphere. 

Even when their fire was no more than a heap of gray 
ashes with a golden core, and one of their lee ports was 
open, the faint, not unpleasant smell of wood smoke 
hung about the cabin. But this was quite different, — 
an acrid, pungent smell as of burning fat. He glanced 
at the fire and raked his mind for an explanation of it. 

“It is worse in my room,” she said, and he went 
quietly to the sacred little passage off which her sleep- 
ing-apartment opened. 

Yes, it was worse there, and what it meant he could 
not imagine. 

“You have not been burning anything he asked. 

“Nothing. The horrid smell wakened me.” 

He turned and ran up the companion-steps, with a 
vague idea that something in the hold might have 
caught fire, though how that could be was beyond him. 
There was nothing there but their reserve stores, and 
certainly nothing that could take fire of its own ac- 
cord. Besides, it was two days since he had been down 
there, and he never took a light, as the hatch, when 
shoved askew, gave all that was needed. 

He fumbled the bolts of the little doors open, but the 
doors seemed jammed. He pushed. They remained 
firm. He made sure of the bolts again and put his 
shoulder to the doors. They resisted all his efforts. 


214 


; MAID OF THE MIST 


‘‘Good Lord !” he said, in something of a panic. 
“What’s all this?” 

He brushed hastily down past The Girl again, groped 
for his boots by the side of his blankets, pulled them on, 
and picked up his axe, with the certainty in his mind 
that something wrong was toward and it was as well to 
be fully armed. 

Then he smashed away at the woodwork till it was in 
fragments, and he could climb up through the bristling 
splinters and over an unexpected plank that had some- 
how got across the doors and prevented their opening. 

The first thing he saw when he got on deck was a 
faint glow about the main-hatch opening, and smoke 
pouring out of it. Running to it, a glance showed him 
a fierce fire roaring somewhere down below. A cry of 
dismay at his side told him that The Girl had scrambled 
up after him. 

“The buckets,” he jerked, and she sped back, tearing 
skin and garment on the splintered doors, while he 
sought and found a length of rope. 

His voice was steady again, though his hands shook 
with agitation, as he slipped one end of the rope through 
the handle of the bucket and held the two ends, while 
the bucket hung in the bight and so could be released 
instantly by loosing one end of the rope. He filled both 
buckets and with a hasty, “Hand them down to me and 
fill again as I throw them up,” lowered himself into the 
hold. 

The fire was burning fiercely against the after star- 
board bulkhead, which, as it happened, was the one 
nearest The Girl’s sleeping-cabin. Their lighter stores 
had been moved from their usual places and heaped 
about it and were blazing furiously. The bulkhead it- 
self was on fire, but had apparently only just caught. 

Wulf flung his first bucketfull at it, and it answered 
with a hiss like a snarling curse, and showed a red- 
starred black blotch amid the crawling yellow flames. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


215 


He tossed the empty bucket up on deck, and gave the 
bulkhead another dose with his second, and as he tossed 
that one up the first came dangling down filled again. 

“Good girl !” he shouted exultantly, to reassure her. 
“Plenty more! We shall do it all right,” and the full 
buckets came dangling down as fast as he could empty 
them. 

A score or so of bucketfulls ended it, and he climbed 
up, black with smoke and streaked with steam and 
sweat, and very graceful to be in fresh air again. 

The night was just thinning towards the dawn. The 
Girl was sitting on the coaming of the hatch in a state 
of collapse, her wet garment clinging clammily about 
her, her head in her hands, her slender figure shaken 
with convulsive sobs. His anger boiled furiously at 
thought of the malice that had planned her suffering — 
her possible death. Love and pity swelled his heart for 
her. She looked so utterly forlorn and broken with the 
fight. 

“It is all right, dear!” — he could not help it, it 
slipped out in spite of him. “Come away down to the 
cabin. You are shivering. You are wet through and 
torn to pieces. You have done splendidly, but it was 
an upsetting piece of business all round. Come !” and 
he put his arm under hers, and drew her up. 

She was so limp, however, that he had almost to carry 
her, and the feel of her unconscious sobs under his en- 
folding arm quickened his blood again. 

At the companion-doors he had to release her and go 
back for his axe. A stout plank had been cunningly 
bound against the doors by a rope tied round the com- 
panion. His lips tightened sternly as he chopped the 
rope through and the plank fell to the deck. 

He carried her gently down and laid her on his 
blankets, put some sticks on the fire and blew them into 
flame, and set on the kettle, which was fortunately full. 
By the time he had made some coffee and dashed it with 


216 


MAID OF THE MIST 


rum, she had recovered herself and was sitting up in 
the blankets with one drawn closely about her. 

“That was an unnerving business,” he said, as he 
handed her her cup. “I’m afraid you had the worst of 
it. You have a lot of scratches — and your hands ! Oh, 
I am truly sorry ” 

“It was the rope,” she said quietly, looking at the 
rasped rawness of them. “It was all horrible. How did 
it get on fire.f^” 

“It was a deliberate attempt on the part of that 
wretch to make an end of us.” 

“No !” — and she gazed at him in blankest amazement. 

“Without doubt. He blocked our doors here with a 
plank and a rope, and then started the fire down in the 
hold.” 

“Is such wickedness possible 

“To a madman living chiefly on rum anything is pos- 
sible.” 

“He deserves to die.” 

“Richly. He deserves no mercy. The thought of 
cutting him down with an axe was horrible. But after 
this ” 

“There is no safety for us while he lives.” 

“I’m afraid there isn’t.” 

Sleep, he knew, would brace her unstrung nerves bet- 
ter than anything else, so, after bathing her hands in 
luke-warm water and anointing them with some of the 
rendered pork fat she kept for her cooking, he induced 
her to go and lie down in her bunk. Her other scratches 
she said she would attend to when she could see them 
properly. 

Then he went on deck and drew up a bucket of water 
and washed off his own stains, and afterwards smoked 
many pipes as he pondered the unpleasantly weighty 
subject of Macro. For that matters could go on like 
this was out of the question. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


217 


XLII 

He had cakes made and breakfast all ready long before 
she came out of her room, still visibly feeling the ef- 
fects of the night’s proceedings. 

“I am stiff and sore all over,” she said, lowering her- 
self carefully to her seat on the floor. “And you.^” 

“Sorer in mind than in body.” 

“What will you do 

“I shall go over presently and tell him that now he 
must look out for himself. I will end him, the first 
chance I get, as I would a wild beast.” 

“He will try to kill you on the spot.” 

“He won’t get the chance. I’ll see to that.” 

“I shall go with you.” 

“No.” 

“Yes, indeed. My heart would thump itself to pieces, 
waiting here all alone.” 

“He is dangerous, and he has a vile tongue when it 
runs away with him ” 

“I do not care. It is no more dangerous for me than 
for you. No — no — no !” — as he was about to argue the 
matter, — “I cannot be left behind,” and nothing he 
could say could move her. 

They saw no sign of life on the ‘Jane and Mary,’ not 
so much as a whiff of smoke from the companion-hatch. 

“Perhaps he fled when he saw his horrid scheme had 
failed,” suggested The Girl hopefully. 

“Not very likely, I’m afraid, but we can go across 
and see. Won’t you be good now and take my advice 

99 

“I’ll be good, but I won’t stop here alone.” 

So perforce he took her with him on the raft, and 
paddled quietly across to the other ship. 

But before they reached it she lifted a warning finger 
for him to stop paddling and listen. And on their anx- 


218 


MAID OF THE MIST 


ious ears there broke the strangest medley of sounds 
conceivable, and chilled them in the hearing. Wild 
bursts of laughter, cut short by yells of rage or sudden 
screams, as of one in mortal fear, — hoarse shouts, tor- 
rents of oaths, dull flailing blows which sounded like 
fists on wood, and, through it all, the never-ceasing 
yells and screams. 

“He has gone mad,” panted The Girl, very white in 
the face, and looked at him with wide anxious eyes. 

“Delirium tremens,” — with an understanding nod. 
“He trould stand more than most, but a man cannot live 
on rum alone,” and he paddled slowly towards the ship, 
his face knitted with doubts as to what he should do. 

He was in two minds. If he left the man to himself 
he would inevitably die in the end, for he had unlimited 
liquor on board and would turn to it at once, like a hog 
to its mire, as soon as this bout ran its course. On the 
other hand, every fragment of professional instinct in 
him impelled him to the rescue. 

Never in his life had he withheld aid from one in 
extremity. And yet it seemed monstrously absurd — to 
drag a man back from death solely for the purpose of 
letting him do his best to kill you, the first chance that 
offered. 

And he had more than himself to think for. Suppose 
he saved this wretched man, and was worsted by him 
later on, what of The Girl.? She would have reason 
enough to blame his pusillanimity, and he himself would 
curse it with his last breath. 

But was it fair fighting — to see your enemy in a hole 
and make no effort to save him.? Old-time Chivalry 
would never even have argued the matter. It would 
have helped the enemy out, handed him his weapons, 
and couretously awaited the renewal of the combat. Ah 
— times were changed. . . . And this man was com- 
pound of treachery and malice. 

Thoughts such as these whirled through his brain 


MAID OF THE MIST 


219 


before he had covered the short space to the other ship. 

“Wait here!” he said to The Girl, and climbed 
through the well-known hole in the side, — and she fol- 
lowed him close in spite of his frowning objection. She 
had not come thus far to be out of the critical moment. 

He ran down to the cabin, and went straight to the 
mate’s door. The dreadful sounds, — the shouts and 
yells and cries of fear, the furious oaths, the wild 
thumping blows — filled the cabin with horrors. Even 
in that anxious moment The Girl was cognisant of a 
dreary, dirty, repulsive look about it which had not 
been there before. It was more like the den of a wild 
beast than a living-room. Some of the silken hangings 
weer torn down, the one or two that were left hung by 
single pegs. It looked as though a maniac had chased 
his mad fancies round the room and sought them be- 
hind the draperies. 

Wulf, gripping his axe, opened the door into the 
passage, looked in, then went in. And The Girl drew 
near, to be at hand in case of need, and stood shudder- 
ing. 

“Keep off I Keep off, ye blank-eyed deevils I 

1 Wi’ your bloody beaks and tearing claws. 

. . . Keep oflT I Keep off ye !” and the 

black fists, all bruised and bleeding, whirled and struck 
at the roof and sides of the bunk as he fought the birds 
the rum had bred in his brain. Then, as they beat him 
down in a pestiferous crowd, he gave a shrill scream and 
doubled himself over in a heap in his bunk, with his 
hands clasped over his head to save it from their at- 
tacks. Then up again, shouting and fighting for dear 
life, and down flat again with a scream, cowering in ut- 
termost extremity of terror, while oaths dribbled out of 
him like water out of a spout. 

Wulf came out and closed the door, and pushed her 
brusquely up the stairs to the deck. 

“You should not have come down,” he said sternly. 


220 


MAID OF THE MIST 


“This is no place for you,” and then, seeing how 
white her face was, he added more gently, “There is no 
danger — except to him. He is fighting for his life with 
the birds. I can do nothing for him — except get rid of 
all his rum. He would turn to it the moment he comes 
round, and it is poison in his present state.” 

He went down again and rooted about everywhere, 
found two kegs in the cabin under the torn hangings, 
and another in Macro’s room, with a spigot in it. He 
carried them up on deck, staved in the heads with his 
axe, and emptied them overboard. In the main-hold he 
found three more and did the same with them. 

“When he gets through, his throat will be like a lime- 
kiln. There is a bucket of water down there. I will put 
in it the coffee we left from breakfast and leave it in his 
cabin. It will be the best thing for him if he will drink 

it. But he’ll be crazy for rum I’ll take you back 

and get the coffee. I’m sorry you came.” 

There was strong disapproval in his tone, but she did 
not resent it. After all, his thought was entirely for 
her in the matter. 

“You’re sure he won’t fly at you.?^” she asked anx- 
iously. 

“He’s much too busy with the birds. Besides, I shall 
not touch him or speak to him. It is best to leave him 
to himself. We will leave some food by him also,” and 
she obediently let herself down before him on to the 
raft. 

“It does seem absurd ” she began impulsively, as 

they joggled along. 

“To keep him alive so that he may try again to kill 
us,” — he nodded. “I know. But there it is, as the 
country-folk say. However, he won’t live long if he 
keeps on at the rum. As soon as he gets better he’ll go 
straight out to the pile to get more, unless he’s too 
weak. It’s terribly wasteful work, what he’s at, and no 
food to work on.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


221 


“Whether it’s wrong or not, I cannot help wishing 
he would die,” she said passionately. “It is too dread- 
ful.” 

“I don’t want his blood on my hands if I can help it,” 
he said briefly. But he felt as she did. 


XLIII 

After carrying supplies to the mate, he came back for 
her, and they went ashore for fresh water, and he prov- 
idently secured a couple more rabbits. 

The Girl was very quiet, depressed, and very unlike 
her usual bright self. But he was not surprised. Her 
anxiety for the future was enough to account for it, 
and there was, besides, the reaction from the strenuous 
upsetting through which they had just passed. 

Each morning he went across to see how the sick man 
was getting on, and she let him go alone, but followed 
him with anxious eyes, and stood in the bows watching 
till she saw him safely on his way back. 

On the third day they took advantage of the enemy’s 
enforced inactivity to go out to the pile and make good 
the losses caused by the fire. And all the time they 
were away The Girl was in a state of dire anxiety lest 
he should have discovered their absence and got across 
and fired their ship. But to her great relief it was there 
all right when they got back, and showed no signs of 
visitation. 

On the fourth morning Wulf found his patient suffi- 
ciently recovered to be spoken to plainly as to the fu- 
ture, and he did not mince matters. While he spoke, 
the mate lay watching him through almost closed eyes, 
just one narrow line between the heavy lids catching the 
light from the port and imparting a singularly sinister 
look to the haggard face. The veiled eyes watched him 
cautiously, charged with whati^ — suspicion hatred.^ 


222 


MAID OF THE MIST 

treachery? All these, Wulf imagined. But they gave 
no sign. They were like the eyes of a snake, of a caged 
beast being rated by its keeper. 

“Your dastardly attempt on us failed,” said Wulf, to 
the steely glint of the black soul behind the narrowed 
lids. “And now, — understand! You are outside the 
pale. Leave us alone and we leave you alone. Inter- 
fere further with us and I will kill you as I would a 
dangerous beast. Now you are warned, and your blood 
be on your own head.” 

The other made no sign. The narrow gleam of the 
dark eyes out of the rigid impassivity of the dark face 
was more bodeful than a torrent of curses. 

As he left the ship, Wulf picked up and took with him 
the only two axes he could find. Magnanimity had its 
limits, but it was wasted here. 

“Well?” asked The Girl anxiously, when he returned. 

“He is almost himself again, but very much weakened 
of course. I have given him final warning that if he 
molests us further I shall kill him.” 

“It would have been simpler to let him die.” 

VSimpler — yes, but I could not bring myself to it. 
We’ll fight him fair if fight we must.” 

The weather still kept dull and gray and heavy, with 
a reserve of menace and malice in it akin to that of the 
mate. The sky was veiled with ever-hurrying clouds. 
The sea was smooth, with something of treachery in its 
sullen quietude, as though it were only biding its time 
to break out again and do its worst. 

The following morning, to their surprise, they saw 
Macro start out early for the wreckage. And Wulf, 
watching him grimly, said, “He’s after his poison. And 
now he’ll probably drink himself to death. It’s amazing 
the hold it takes on a man. He won’t trouble us much 
longer.” 

They spent the day ashore, but the vivacity and en- 
joyment of that other day were awanting. Perhaps it 


MAID OF THE MIST 223 

was the cheerless weather, — the physical and mental 
strain of these later days, — the thought that their devil 
was loosed again, — anyhow, a subtle sense of forebod- 
ing. Whatever it was it weighed upon their spirits, 
and a long tramp up the beach, in forlorn hope of meet- 
ing Mistress Seal again, did not succeed in raising them. 

“What is it, I wonder said The Girl. “Something 
is going to happen, I know. I have felt like this before, 
and always something dreadful has followed.” 

“But you never knew what, beforehand Perhaps 
you have the gift of prevision, — the second sight.” 

“I may have, but it doesn’t go so far as to explain 
things. I just feel anxious for it to be over and done 
with.” 

“What.?” 

“What’s coming, whatever it is.” 

“We must be extra careful for a time, till you are 
sure the trouble is past,” he said, with a smile, but he 
felt the weight on his spirits as sh^ did. 

Physically, however, their long tramp did them good, 
and they returned home with famous appetites. 

“I wonder if he’s back yet,” said The Girl, as they 
were paddling to the ship. There was no doubt as to 
where her fears centred. 

“I don’t see the raft. We’ll see better from the 
deck,” and when they had climbed aboard they looked 
at once towards the spit and saw the mate’s raft still 
lying there. He was not back yet. 

They ate, and rested, and until the darkness swal- 
lowed the spit, the raft still lay there. 

“He’s staying late,” said Wulf. “Maybe he’s 
broached a keg and taken too much. It would be what 
I would expect from him under the circumstances.” 

He patrolled the deck, after she had gone to bed, lis- 
tening for the sound of the mate’s oar. But he heard 
nothing, and at last made up his mind that the fellow 
had probably waited too late and had made himself 


224 


MAID OF THE MIST 


snug out there for the night, though, for himself, the 
idea would not have commended itself. There was little 
danger, however, of his coming across in the dark, so 
he went down and slept soundly at the foot of the com- 
panion-steps. 

All the next day they were on the look-out for him, 
but he did not come. 

Wulf had told her of his idea that he had probably 
found means of passing the night out there, in which 
case he would no doubt put in another long day rooting 
for treasure. So that it was not until night had fallen 
again, and the raft still lay waiting on the spit, that he 
decided in his own mind that something was wrong. 

“I shall go across to the pile in the morning to find 
out,” he said, as they sat by the fire. 

“I shall go with you.” 

“I would very much sooner you stopped here.” 

“And suppose it was all a trick on his part. He may 
be hiding in the sandhills. He would watch you go and 
then come out on me. No,” with a very decided shake 
of the head, “I go with you.” 

So, in the morning, they set off, walked along the spit 
to the western point and waded and swam to the wreck- 
age, keeping a keen look-out for first sight of the mate. 

“Those hideous birds!” panted The Girl, as the 
skirling, squabbling crew swooped and hovered over the 
far end of the pile. 

“We’ll keep as far away from them as possible,” and 
they crept up at a distance, and he proceeded to make a 
raft, since a supply of further stores was needed to 
make good their losses by the fire. 

So far they had come upon no signs of Macro. From 
the top of the pile they looked carefully all round, but 
beyond the usual smashed boxes and cases there was 
nothing to show that he had ever been there. 

“Where on earth can he have got to.?”’ said Wulf. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


225 


“Perhaps he’s fallen into the sea, or down into some 
crack,” said The Girl, not unhopefully. 

“It is always possible. He might not recognise how 
the fever had pulled him down.” 

They loaded their raft without any interference from 
the birds, beyond the blood-curdling clamour of their 
angry disputations. They were quite ready to go, but 
still the whereabouts of the mate was a mystery, and 
Wulf was loth to leave it at that. He might be lying 
broken in some crack. If he had come to some sudden 
end it would be best to know it, if that were possible, so 
that their fears — on their own account as well as his — 
might be at rest. On the other hand it was quite im- 
possible to rake over the whole pile. That would be a 
good month’s work. 

A grim idea shot suddenly into Wulf’s mind, as he 
stood looking keenly round from the highest point he 
could clamber up to. It came at sight of the birds 
whirling and clamouring round the end of the pile. 
Suppose . . . oh, — horrible! . . . yet it might very 
well be. 

“What is it.?” asked The Girl anxiously, for his lips 
and face had tightened ominously at his thought. 

“Nothing, maybe. I’m going over there to see. . . .” 

“Can you see anything of him.?” 

“No.” 

He poled the raft along the edge of the pile towards 
the hovering cloud of birds. 

“Now, I’m going to swim along here and climb up. I 
want to see what they’re at. You will be quite safe 
here.” 

She glanced at him with a startled look, fathoming 
his grim thought instantly, and it blanched her face for 
a moment. 

“They may turn on you,” she jerked. 

“They seem too busy.” 

He let himself down into the water and swam noise- 


226 


MAID OF THE MIST 


lessly along the side of the pile, and she stood watching 
anxiously. 

When he reached the outskirts of the whirling cloud 
he found a sodden crack, and drew himself in, and dis- 
appeared from her sight. Her heart kicked till it felt 
like choking her. Her face was strained, her eyes wide 
and fearful. She felt horribly alone. 

Inside his niche, Wulf climbed cautiously, the curd- 
ling clamour very close. Now and again a feathery 
fiend with eyes like glass and reddened beak swooped 
past his hiding-place, with a shrill cry of warning to 
the rest at sight of him, or it might be of invitation. 

He got his eyes above the top at last, in spite of 
pointed attentions from angry outsiders, scanned the 
spot where the shrieking crew centred most thickly, and 
dreamed of what he got a glimpse of there for weeks 
afterwards. 

The remnants of what had been a man, all 

pecked and scratched and torn to shreds, — white, 
clean-picked bones showing through fragments of his 
clothing, myriads of squawking birds, of all shapes and 
sizes, clustered on it like bees on a comb, hustling and 
fighting one another with shrill screams and thrashing 
wings and red beaks. It was only when, through some 
unusually bitter struggle, the mass writhed and rose for 
a moment, only to settle more closely the next, that he 
could see. Not far from the body was a broached keg 
which the birds had overturned in their strife. It ex- 
plained everything to him. 

He dropped back down his cleft, sick at the sight, 
grateful for the clean feel of the water. He plunged 
his head under and spat out the feeling of it all. Then 
he made his way quietly back to The Girl, and she had 
no need to ask what he had found. He nodded, and 
climbed up on the raft and pushed quickly away. 

‘‘You are sure he is dead.?” she asked, after a time. 

“Horribly dead,” and told her no more till later, and 


MAID OF THE MIST 


227 


then not very much. “It is strange to think of it all,” 
he said, in conclusion. “He always feared the birds. 
In his delirium it was the birds he was fighting. And 
the birds got him at last.” 

The manner of his death shocked and horrified them. 
But the knowledge that the menace of him had passed 
out of their lives was untellable relief. 


BOOKj IV 


LOVE IN A MIST 


XLIV 

The effect of the mate’s death on The Girl’s spirits was 
visible at once. The cloud had lifted from her face 
before they got fairly home. Her eyes shone untrou- 
bled, though a look of horror and disgust came into 
them whenever they rested on the swirling gray cloud 
behind them. In her very movements Wulf noticed a 
new and gracious freedom. 

And his judgment did her no injustice in the matter, 
nor imputed it, in any slightest degree, to mere exulta- 
tion over a fallen enemy. For he knew to the full in 
what terror of the dead man she had lived, and how the 
fear of him, both for herself and himself, had lain like 
a weight on her soul and darkened all her outlook. 

He felt as she did about it. He could not regret the 
fact of the man’s death, but the manner of it gave him 
poignant distress. 

In spite of their hard work they had neither of them 
much appetite for food that night. They turned in 
early and slept as they had not slept for long, without 
fear and without strain. The darkness was no longer 
pregnant with ungaugeable terrors. The dawn was like 
the beginning of a new life to them. 

Wulf, indeed, saw again that night, and many a night 
thereafter, the horror of the clustering birds and that 
over which they bristled and fought. But he woke each 
time to the immeasurable relief of the man’s death. 

228 


MAID OF THE MIST 


229 


That had been essential to their own safety, but he 
thanked God with his whole heart that it had not been 
by his hand that he had had to die. For that he never 
could be sufficiently grateful. He had played him fair 
and more than fair. He was dead, and their con- 
sciences and their hearts were alike at rest. 

They woke next morning to the close folding of the 
mist, and he had to set to work at once making good the 
broken companion-doors to keep it out of the cabin as 
much as possible. 

Being but a poor carpenter, the only way he could do 
this was by nailing a blanket to the top of the hatch 
and pegging it down tightly to the top step. But he 
foresaw that the next gale would blow his stop-gap to 
pieces and destroy their comfort below. So did the 
dead man’s deeds live after him, and it was not the only 
one. 

They were sitting at their mid-day meal, when the 
thick silence of the mist outside was rent by a shrill 
frightened scream right above their heads, and almost 
simultaneous with it a heavy thump, and then, on the 
deck above them, blows and screams and the sound of 
some large body tumbling to and fro. 

The Girl sprang up with a white face and scared eyes 
and a word of dismay. Wulf picked up his axe and 
burst through his carefully adjusted blanket at the top 
of the companion. Then she heard the chop-chop of 
his axe on the deck, and the fall of something into the 
water, and he came down laughing at the start it had 
given him also. 

“It was the biggest bird I ever saw,” he said. “It 
had banged itself against the mast, I think, and was 
flopping all over the place. I chopped its head off and 
pitched it overboard. It must have measured six feet 
at least from tip to tip of its wings. It gave you a 
start.” 

“I was just thinking of that man and how different 


230 


MAID OF THE MIST 


everything was how he is gone, and then that horrid 
scream ” 

“Yes, it was enough to make anyone jump.” 

“It seemed to me for a moment that it was his spirit 
come back to trouble us still, as he had done while he 
lived.” 

“It won’t come. Unless it’s got inside a bird, as he 
always said. You must try to forget all about him.” 

“It is not easy. But, whether it is wicked of rhe or 
not, I thank God he is dead.” 

“And I thank God that he did not die by my hand. I 
shall never cease to be thankful for that.” 

“We shall never be able to build a boat now,” she 
said presently, following out the natural train of her 
thought. 

“I’m afraid not,” — with a doleful shake of the head. 
“Unless you have had any experience in such things.” 

“And so we may have to pass the rest of our lives 
here.” 

“It is better to consider how very much worse off we 
might be. For myself. . . . Besides, one never knows. 
Some unexpected chance may turn up.” 

“And you can bear to think of living on and on and 
on here till — the end.^” 

“I can bear to think of it very much better than I 
could a short time ago. ... No cloud is black on both 
sides. Look on the bright side. Either of us might 
have been here alone. That would have been terrible 

?j 

“I should have been dead.” 

“But instead of that we are two, we have comfortable 
shelter, the mighty blessing of fire, food enough to last 
us as long as we live ” 

“It sounds like that man in the Bible — the man who 
had his barns full, all he wanted to eat and drink, and 
so he made merry. And that night he. died, if I re- 
member rightly.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


231 


“We are not boasting. We arrived here lacking 
everything, and everything has been provided for us. 
We have reason to be grateful. Even Macro was nec- 
essary. He showed us how to turn the wreck-pile to 
account. If I had come ashore alone I doubt if I would 
ever have gone out to it again. It did not attract me. 
. . . And — he found you and brought you ashore.” 

“And that was the beginning of the end.” 

“No — the beginning of better things. We will hope 
the end is a long way off yet.” 

“I wonder . . . and what it will be,” said she 
thoughtfully. 

And he wondered if in her heart there was any sweet 
white seed of hope akin to that which was striking its 
roots so deeply in his own, — and if not, if it might be 
possible to plant it there. 


XLV 

This new life, free from the shadow of perpetual 
menace, was full of rare and delicate charm for both 
of them, differing only in quality and degree according 
to that wherewith Nature had endowed them. 

One root-thought was inevitable to both their minds 
— that here were they two, cut off from the rest of the 
world, probably for the term of their natural lives. 
Here, as far as they could foresee, they two must live, 
alone, — together; and here, in the end, they must die; 
their living and their dying alike unseen and unknown 
except by their Maker. 

In his heart the white seed of the greater hope was 
striking deep and strong, filling his whole being with a 
new and exquisite delight before even it had had time 
to shoot and flower. 

Exile for life on that barren strip of sand, which 


2S2 


MAID OF THE MIST 


with Macro as sole fellow-sufferer would have been 
barely tolerable, assumed a very different aspect with 
Avice Drummond as his companion; and with her as 
sole companion, an aspect of supremest joy and expec- 
tation. It was no longer a thing to look forward to 
with foreboding, or at best with dull and hopeless ac- 
quiescence in the inevitable. The shadow had suddenly 
lifted. The desert had suddenly blossomed like the rose. 
The future smiled shyly as does the dawn with promise 
of the day. 

But this new great hope, and the sense of it all in 
him, were of so fine and delicate a nature that he hardly 
dared to whisper it even in his inmost heart, lest she 
should see some sign of it and take fright, and all his 
hope vanish like smoke in a gale. 

She was so fair and sweet, so charming and gracious, 
so pre-eminently and perfectly desirable. It was high- 
est and keenest delight — delight so keen that at times 
it had in it the elements of pain — simply to watch the 
play of her face, so eloquently responsive to the quick 
emotional soul within, — the large dark eyes so clear and 
frank, so unreservedly trustful of him. 

He would sooner die than forfeit one iota of the 
honour her faith conferred on him. And that great 
springing hope of his must be carefully covered and 
concealed, until such time as he should discover in her 
eyes the outlook of a hope responsive. 

It would come. It would come, he said to himself — 
in time — when she should have come to know him still 
better and to trust him still more fully — to the utter- 
most. 

For the ultimate goal of his desire was, in the man- 
ner of its possible attainment at all events, somewhat 
nebulous to him, though it set the whole distant future 
ablaze with rosy fires. In the nature of things, circum- 
stanced as they were, such ultimate attainment, if ever 
it were reached, could be reached only by the treading 


MAID OF THE MIST 


233 


of unusual ways. And to require that of any girl — 
and especially of a girl such as this, high-born, intelli- 
gent beyond most, and deeply versed in the great 
world’s ways — was asking of her more than any true 
man, truly loving, could bring himself to ask, — unless 
to both their hearts no other thing were possible, — un- 
less the barrier of Circumstance left no other possible 
hope or way. 

And for the proving of that. Time held the keys and 
must have his say. 

He wondered often, and with keenest anxiety, if her 
heart could possibly have come through all the strange 
experiences of her previous life unchallenged, unas- 
sailed, unwon. Seeing that she was what she was it 
seemed to him almost impossible. 

She was to him so compact of goodness and beauty, 
so fashioned to bewitch, that he could not imagine any 
man impervious to her grace and charm. What manner 
of men could they be who, consorting with her daily 
and on terms of equality, had failed to capture a heart 
so made for loving.? 

He recalled in minutest detail all she had told him of 
her past life and friends and acquaintances, figured 
them all in his mind, weighed them jealously in the 
scales of his own devotion, and could not discover one 
trace of emotion towards one or another, but rather of 
aversion towards all. 

Again and again she had expressed the joy she had 
felt at the prospect of her escape to a freer and larger 
life. It was, of course, not impossible that that feeling 
might but hide some heart-breaking disappointment of 
the earlier times. But he did not think so. She was 
to him truth personified, though still a woman. He be- 
lieved in her absolutely, as a man should in the woman 
who holds his heart. So far as assurance could go, — 
without the definite question which he longed to put but 
did not yet dare, lest the hopeful anxiety of his present 


234 


MAID OF THE MIST 


state should be turned to hopeless regret, — ^he felt 
fairly safe in building on a rosy future. 

How she regarded himself he could not surely say. 
But she trusted him and that was a good foundation 
for his building. 

And she.? Well, that is our story! 

XL VI 

That thick white bank of mist clung to them for the 
best part of a week. But, freed from all fear of treach- 
erous assault, it troubled them little. 

Once they had to go ashore for water, but got back 
safely by means of their guiding-line, and as they 
pushed through the fog they recalled that former time, 
when the mate’s grim figure fashioned itself suddenly 
out of the clammy whiteness and brought them near to 
a disastrous end. 

For the rest they had no scarcity. The fish bit as 
well in the fog as in the clear, and they had pork and 
fiour for weeks to come. 

In their narrow confinement to the ship, their inti- 
macy and knowledge of one another grew with the days. 
She talked well, and he was an excellent listener, and 
led her on and on to tell him of the past and all that 
had interested her in it, and mused on all she said, and 
sought in it enlightenment as to her heart’s freedom or 
otherwise. 

Once, when she had been roving at length through 
her earlier days, she broke off suddenly with, “But, mon 
Dieu, I am doing all the talking! Now, tell me of your- 
self!” 

“I have so little to tell compared with you. Shall I 
tell you of school-days — of college — of the hospitals — 
of my patients and their ailments .?” 

“Tell me why you left it all to seek the new life.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


235 


“For very much the same reason as you did, I im- 
agine. I was living in a groove and I wanted some- 
thing wider and larger.” 

“And now you are sorry.” 

“So very sorry that if I had the chance again, and 
knew beforehand all that was to come, I would jump at 
it like the fish to our hooks,” as he hauled one aboard 
and knocked it on the head. “And you.^” 

“Ye — es, I think I would have come also. Not per- 
haps if I had known I would have to float about on that 
mast. It was so terribly cold,” — with a shiver. “For 
the rest, I have no regrets, but it is perhaps too soon 
to say. In ten years hence I may have come to be 
sorry.” 

“Ay — ten years hence !” he said musingly. “Many 
things may happen in ten years. There’s a fish on your 
hook,” and she hauled it in and let him dispose of it. 

As they sat at supper that night the blanket which 
supplied the place of companion-doors began to flap, 
and^ going up to look, he found the mist whirling away 
before a gusty breeze. 

“It’s going to blow,” he told her, “and when it’s 
blown itself out we may have a spell of fine weather 
again,” and he proceeded to block the opening with 
some planks he had chipped to size as well as he could 
with his axe. 

The wind was rising rapidly, and before they turned 
in for the night the birds had all come in and were 
whirling and screaming round the ship, and lighting on 
it as was their custom in bad weather. But they had 
grown accustomed to their clamour and both slept 
soundly. 

Wulf was shaken back to life in the dead of the early 
morning by a restive jerk of the ship at her rusty 
anchor-chain, followed by a momentary sense of the un- 
usual. And while he lay sleepily considering the mat- 
ter, his bunk heeled slowly over — over — over, and rolled 


236 


MAID OF THE MIST 


him right against the side of the ship. The sound of a 
heavy fall, somewhere beyond, made him scramble out 
very wide awake, full of wonder, but dimly perceptive 
of what must have happened. The rusty chain had evi- 
dently parted, the ship had drifted ashore broadside 
on, and the force of the wind had caused her to heel 
over. The sound he had heard was, he feared, of Miss 
Drummond’s falling out of her bunk. 

He flung on some clothes and clawed his way out to 
the cabin. The floor of it was tilted up at such an 
angle that he had to claw his way up by the side wall as 
best he could. 

“Are you hurt.?” he cried, outside The Girl’s door. 

“Bruised a bit. Whatever has happened.?” 

“The cable has parted and we’re ashore on our beam- 
ends. No danger, I think.” 

“I’ll be out in a minute.” 

Then he became aware of a smell of burning, and 
found that the sand hearth with its core of fire had slid 
downhill and was smouldering among the silken draper- 
ies, which were beginning to break into flame. 

He crawled back and tore them down and bunched 
them tightly together, then scooped up handfuls of 
sand and somthered every cinder he could see. 

Miss Drummond’s door opened just as he had fin- 
ished. 

“Stop where you are,” he cried. “I’ll come up for 
you. Everything’s on the slope. I think we’d better 
sit on the floor and let ourselves down by degrees.” 

Outside, the wild screaming of the birds mingled 
eerily with the rush and howl of the gale. It was still 
quite dark. He could not see her, but groped about till 
he felt her blankets, then found her hand and eased her 
carefully down the slope, and they crouched side by side 
in the angle made by the floor and the side of the ship. 

“Will she go down.?” she asked quietly. 

“Oh, no. No fear of that. We’re aground. But 


MAID OF THE MIST 


237 


whether she’ll ever come straight again I don’t know. 
Did it pitch you out of your bunk.f^” 

“Yes. I woke with a crash on the floor, and could 
not imagine what had happened.” 

“I hope you didn’t break yourself.” 

She was silent for a moment and then said, ‘I’m 
afraid I did break something, but I couldn’t ” 

“Broke something.? What.?” he asked hastily. 

“My arm feels numb and queer. I fell on it.” 

“Let me feel it,” and, kneeling in front of her, he 
groped till he found it, and felt it with anxious gentle 
fingers. 

“Good Lord, it’s broken!” 

“I’m sorry, but I couldn’t help it. You see” 

“Your right arm too! Don’t move it!” 

He groped about for another length of the silken 
hangings, tore it down, and wound it tightly round her 
arm. “That will keep it in place,” he said. “The 
moment it is light I will make splints and set it prop- 
erly. I am truly sorry you should have suffered so.” 

“Better me than you. It might have been worse. 
What made that chain break, I wonder.? We’ve had 
worse storms than this.” 

“It was bound to give sooner or later. It was very 
old and rusted. Its time came, I suppose, and it went. 
Sure you have no other damages .?” 

“Only bumps and bruises. I felt as if the side of my 
face were crushed in, but I don’t think it is.” 

“Were you in the top bunk.?” 

“Yes. I liked to look out of the window in the morn- 
ings.” 

“That’s a good big fall to take unawares.” 

“Yes, I fell out like a sack and woke on the floor. 
What shall we do if she doesn’t come right side up 
again.? We can’t live all upside down like this.” 

“There’s always the other ship to fall back on . . . 
unless her chain’s broken too.” 


238 


MAID OF THE MIST 


‘‘I like our own much the best.” 

“But not if she stops like this. . . . And even if she 
straightened up she would heel over again in the next 
gale. I’m afraid we’ll have to move.” 

“I shall always see that man’s black face about the 
cabin, glaring at me as he used to do as if he wanted to 
eat me.” 

“If we have to go we’ll give it a good cleaning, and 
fresh hangings, and make it to your taste.” 

So they chatted quietly, while the gale and the birds 
shrieked in chorus outside, and the waves of the lake 
thumped scornfully on the exposed bottom of the ship. 

As soon as he could see, he rooted about for axe and 
knife, and chopped up a board and made a set of splints 
for her arm. And, though he grieved for the pain she 
must have suffered, he could not but feel a huge en- 
joyment in ministering to her. 

The mere touch of her firm white flesh was a rare 
delight and made his fingers tingle. He did his best to 
think of her only as a patient, but found it impossible. 
She was so very much more to him than any ordinary 
patient ever had been or could be. 

But for her suffering, he felt inclined to bless the 
breaking of the rusty cable. It brought them closer 
than ever before. It threw her more than ever on to 
his care. With her right arm prisoner she would be 
able to do but little for herself. She had not been able 
to dress herself properly, but had simply swathed a 
blanket about her night attire, leaving the broken arm 
free. But even so, her natural taste and capability had 
so arranged it, even in the darkness and moment of 
danger, that she looked like a Greek goddess, he said to 
himself, with one arm in a sling. One can make allow- 
ances for him. 

As the light grew stronger he saw, to his distress, 
that her face had also suffered sorely in her fall. The 
whole right side was badly bruised and discoloured. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


239 


‘Ts it very bad?” she asked, as she saw him looking 
at it. “It feels sore and my head hums like a bee-hive.” 

“You got a bad bump there. I will get some salt 
water and bathe it. Our fresh will all be gone in the 
upset, but ril sling a bucket under the scupper-hole 
and we’ll have enough for some coffee presently. When 
you’ve had some breakfast you will go and lie down in 
my bunk. If you could get a good sleep it would be 
the very best thing for you. Does the arm hurt much?” 

“Not so much as it did, but I don’t think I can 
sleep.” 

“You will when you lie down. You’ve had a bad 
shaking up. I’m truly sorry that all the penalties have 
fallen on you.” 

“It’s a good thing you didn’t break yourself too. 
Suppose we’d broken all our arms !” and she laughed a 
wry little laugh. 

Fie crawled up the slope, and wormed himself 
through his barricade, and came back presently with a 
bucketful of water, found a piece of soft linen and in- 
sisted on bathing her face, under plea that she would 
joggle the broken arm if she tried to do it herself. 

Then he scraped together at the foot of the slope 
sand enough for a small hearth, split some wood and 
kindled a fire, but found it necessary to open one of the 
ports to leeward to let out the smoke. When he did so 
he found the water within a foot of it and could only 
hope they would heel over no more. He proceeded to 
make cakes and coffee, and then fried some salt pork, 
and anointed the bruised face with the fat of it, and 
she found it soothing. 

When he had cut up her meat for her, and she had 
managed to eat a little, he helped her into his bunk, the 
upper one because it was airier and allowed more head- 
room, and covered her with blankets and told her to go 
to sleep. And then, since there was nothing more to be 
done, he crawled up the slope and got her blankets off 


240 


MAID OF THE MIST 


the floor of her room, and made up a bed for himself 
in the angle at the foot of the slope. He lay for a time 
listening to the gale, and pondering the possibility of 
its doing them any further damage, and fell asleep with 
the matter still unsettled. 


XLVII 

When he awoke it was close on mid-day, unless his 
appetite misled him. He prepared another meal and 
then tapped gently on The Girl’s door. Receiving no 
answer he peeped into the dim little room and found her 
still sleeping soundly, her head in the crook of her left 
arm, from which the wide sleeve of her nght-dress had 
slipped down, — as fair a picture as man could wish to 
look upon, in spite of her bruised face and broken arm. 

He stood watching her for a moment with bated 
breath, and recalled that first morning when she came 
ashore and he had doubted if he could recover her ; and 
he thanked God again for the dogged obstinacy which 
would not let him accept defeat so long as smallest hope 
remained. 

She moved, opened her heavy eyes, and lay quietly 
looking at him, just as she had done that other time, 
and for a brief space there was no more recognition in 
them than there had been then. 

“What is it? Who are you?” she asked, and he suf- 
fered a momentary shock. But for reply he laid his 
cool strong hand — rougher than it used to be, but 
vitally sensitive to the feel of her — on the broad white 
forehead, and found it hot and throbbing. That did 
not greatly surprise him. There was sure to be a cer- 
tain feverishness after such an experience. And he 
would have given much for five minutes’ root round his 
old dispensary. 

He had nothing, — nothing but common sense, and his 


MAID OF THE MIST 


241 


professional knowledge, and Nature’s simplest reme- 
dies. He went out quietly and got cold water and soft 
linen, and bathed the throbbing forehead and then laid 
the wet bandage on it. 

“That is nice,” she said softly. “What a trouble I 
am to you !” 

“Oh, frightful!” he smiled, as he changed the cloth 
for a fresh one. “You see how I resent it. Has the 
arm been hurting 

“It hurts at times, but my head is the worst, and I 
feel bruised all over.” 

“But no more breakages.^” he asked anxiously. 

“I don’t think so, just bruised and stiff and sore.” 

He hesitated for a second. She was so very much 
more to him than simply a patient. 

“Will you let me remind you that I am a doctor.^ 
The very best cure for all that is gentle rubbing. If 
you will allow me I will undertake to reduce the pains 
by one half.” 

“Then please do. Doctor, for I ache in every bone.” 

And he drew off all her blankets but one, and through 
it proceeded to massage the aching limbs, and had never 
in his life found greater enjoyment in his work. He 
even ventured to treat the throbbing head in the same 
way, drawing his fingers soothingly over the white fore- 
head and up into the masses of her hair. 

“There is virtue in your fingers,” she murmured 
drowsily, and before he had done she was sleeping 
soundly again. Then he laid another wet cloth on her 
forehead and left Nature to do her share in the good 
work. 

It was fortunate that she had little appetite for the 
next few days. The cakes he made for her, and water, 
scrupulously boiled and cooled and flavoured with cof- 
fee, amply satisfied her; and he himself lived on pork, 
fish and fresh meat being unobtainable. 

For four days the gale bellowed round them, but be- 


242 


MAID OF THE MIST 


ing to leeward, and protected somewhat by the heeling 
of the ship, they felt it less than if they had been on 
an even keel, and it never kept The Girl from sleeping. 

Much of that time Wulf spent in an endeavour to 
obtain salt from sea water, the lack of it being, one of 
their greatest deprivations. As the result of many 
boilings and the careful scraping up of the slight en- 
crustations on his pans, he managed to get a little, and 
exultantly let The Girl taste it as a great treat ; but it 
was a long and slow process. 

The default of her right arm made her very depend- 
ent on him in many little ways, but never was service 
more tactfully rendered or more delighted in by the 
servitor. And every service, so rendered and accepted, 
made fo rincreased knowledge on both sides, and so for 
closer intimacy. 

Never, in all her contact with the greater world, had 
she met any man in whom she felt such implicit confi- 
dence as in this man. Never, since that first time her 
wondering eyes met his, when his strenuous exertions 
had dragged her back from the dead, had he by word or 
deed or look, raised one shadow of fear or mistrust in 
her mind. In everything, to the extremest point of 
death itself, he had proved himself a simple, brave, and 
honest gentleman. 

And as she lay there helpless, with the gale howling 
outside and the broken waves of the lake clop-clopping 
in the strakes under her ear, she had much time to think 
of him and all he had done and was doing for her, and 
all her thought was warm and grateful. 

“I am a dreadful burden to you,” she would say. 
“And you are very very good to me.” 

And he would answer her, with the smile she liked to 
provoke, “But for your suffering in the matter I would 
tell you how grateful I am to that rotten chain for giv- 
ing me the opportunity. I count it a privilege as well 
as a pleasure.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


24S 


And when he had left her, she would think at times 
how it might have been with her if it were not this man 
but the other with whom she had been left alone. And 
she would shiver at the thought, and then remember that 
if the other had been alone she would not have been 
there, for he could never have drawn her back from the 
dead as this one had done. 

And she thought also at times of their fight with the 
other in the fog, and followed that idea up and shivered 
still more. For if the mate had killed this man it would 
indeed have gone hard with her. Ay, she had much to 
be thankful for, and thankful she was. 

And as to the future. ... It was all vague and dim, 
as the future always must be, but she had no fear of it, 
because she trusted this man so perfectly. 

Vague and dim it might be, but it was shot with rosy 
gleams. 

Whatever he might ask of her she would hold it right 
because he asked it. She had found him worthy. She 
would trust him completely, ask what he might. Yes, 
. . . ask . . .what . . . he . . . might. 


XL VIII 

‘‘The sun’s coming out,” was his cheerful announce- 
ment, one morning when he came in with her breakfast. 
“And here’s some fish for you at last.” 

“The sight of it makes me hungry.” 

“That’s the best news you’ve given me for four days. 
There’s some salt for you in payment,” he said, with 
full pride of accomplishment. 

“Salt is a great treat. Have you left any for your- 
self.?” 

“Oh, I’ve got some. I’m going to set up a regular 
salt factory as soon as you’re about again.” 


244 


MAID OF THE MIST 


“I would like to get up and go on deck when I’ve had 
breakfast. Surely the ship is not so tilted as it was.” 

‘‘Not quite so bad, but I’m afraid it will never come 
quite right side up again. It’s hard and fast on the 
shore at present. I could wade across.” 

“I must see it. I will get up as soon as I have had 
my breakfast.” 

“Can you manage he asked doubtfully. “You 
must keep that arm quiet, you know.” 

“I’ll try anyway. If I get stuck I will call,” and in 
due course she called, and he found that she had man- 
aged to get her blankets round her, and that as grace- 
fully as ever in some marvellous fashion, but she had 
doubted her power of getting out of the bunk in its- lop- 
sided state without his help. 

He stepped up on to the lower bunk, and worked his 
arms under her. 

“Now, if you wouldn’t mind steadying yourself with 
your usable hand on my shoulder — so ! There you 
are !” and he lifted her gently to her feet on the floor. 
“Now, hang on to my arm. . . . But your shoes? — 
you had better have them on. In your own room of 
course. Wait and I’ll get them,” and he climbed up 
and got them, and put them on and tied them for her. 
“I’ve pegged some slats across the slope for better foot- 
hold. You can’t slip,” and he got her safely out on to 
the deck. 

“It is delightful to be in fresh air again,” she said, 
as she drank it in. “I wish the good weather would 
last for ever.” 

“We’ll hope for a good long spell anyhow. Doesn’t 
it feel odd to be so close to the shore? We’ll have rab- 
bit for dinner. You must almost have forgotten what 
it tastes like.” 

“I can still just remember,” she laughed. 

“I’ll get up some blankets and tuck you into this cor- 
ner, and then I’ll go and get some and some fresh water. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


245 


Our raft’s blown ashore and the other one also. I shall 
have to wade.” 

He made her comfortable in the corner, got his 
buckets and a stick, and dropped over the side. 

She lay watching him as he waded ashore, saw him 
stop for a moment to examine the raft, and then, with 
a wave of the hand, he set off for the pools, swinging his 
buckets jauntily. 

Were there many such men in the world, she won- 
dered, and why had she never met any of them before.? 
The men she had met were so very differnt. They were 
as a rule so elusive and evasive that you never quite 
knew what they were driving at . . . except that it was 
certain to be for their own satisfaction and advantage 
. . . and that unless you were always on your guard it 
was likely to turn out ill for you ... a queer world, 

and life was a puzzle past comprehending 

She was glad to be out of it . . . even on this sand- 
bank. . . . Life was sweeter here, and certainly very 
much simpler. . . . Well, perhaps a little too severely 
simple in some respects. . . . But one could not have 
everything. . . . Thank God, again, that it was this 
man who was with her and not that other ! . . . 

She saw him coming at last with his full buckets, and 
presently made out a couple of rabbits hanging round 
his neck. 

“The birds are having a great time out yonder,” he 
called to her. “Lots of new wreckage, I expect, and 
they’ve been fasting. I must get across as soon as I 
can and see if the storm has brought anything for us. 
One never knows,” — he had come alongside, and lifted 
the buckets and tossed the rabbits on to the deck. “I’ll 
fasten the raft to the chain there” — and he hauled him- 
self along on it to the bows. 

She heard a smothered exclamation, and presently he 
climbed up and came along the deck with something in 
his hand. 


246 


MAID OF THE MIST 


“What is it?” she asked. 

“What do you make of that?” and he handed her the 
link of the rusty cable which had given way and let 
them drift ashore. 

She turned it over in her fingers. Just where it had 
opened, the metal glinted in the sunshine, and just 
above that there was a patch that looked like grease. 

She shook her head. 

“Don’t you see.? — it’s been filed enough to weaken it, 
and there was grease on the file.” 

“And you think ” with a shocked look. 

“Undoubtedly. No one else could have done it. But 
what his idea was, I can’t make out. Just to make trou- 
ble, I suppose. Of course if the wind had come the 
other way, as it has done once or twice, we might have 
blown right down the lake. It was a mean trick. I 
wonder when he did it.” 

“I am more thankful than ever that he’s gone.” 

“So am I. . . . I’ve been thinking we’d better move 
across there as soon as possible.” 

“Must we? I have grown so fond of this old ship.” 

“But we can’t live on the slope like this. Besides, if 
a gale did come the opposite way we might have trouble. 
I’ll go over presently and begin cleaning. When I’ve 
finished you’ll find it much more comfortable than 
this.” 

“I shall always like this the best.” 

“I was thinking as I went over to the pools that it 
might not be a bad idea to build some kind of a house 
on shore. I can get timber enough for a hundred. You 
see, we don’t quite know what winter may be like in this 
place, but it’s pretty sure to be a time of storms.” 

“Can you build a house?” 

“One never knows what one can do till one tries. 
This is a great place for bringing out one’s unknown 
faculties. I’ve done a good many things I never ex- 
pected to do, since I came here.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


247 


‘Tt might be a good plan. Can’t it wait till I can 
help.?” 

“We’ll see. We must do like the ants and squirrels — 
work hard while it’s fine and get in our supplies for the 
winter. We are mighty fortunate to have such a store 
to draw upon.” 

He spent all the rest of the day slaving like a char- 
woman on the ‘Jane and Mary,’ and The Girl lay in her 
nest watching him, as he went up and down, now fling- 
ing rubbish overboard, then hauling up buckets of wa- 
ter, and sluicing and mopping, with every now and 
again a cheery wave of hand or mop in her direction, 
and long periods below devoted, she did not doubt, to 
the doing of more of those things which he had never 
done, or expected to do, until he came there. And her 
heart was very warm to him, knowing that it was not 
for his own comfort but for hers that all these great 
labours were toward. 

She saw him busy on deck, bending and bobbing up 
and down, and once she caught the gleam of vivid col- 
ours, and wondered what he was at. He was a long 
time below after that, and then he went ashore for a 
load of sand, and when it was getting dark she sud- 
denly caught glimpse of his head in the water as he 
w^ound up the day’s work with a very necessary swim. 

He came across on the raft all aglow, but visibly 
tired and hungry, and greeted her with a cheery, “I 
think you’ll find it all to your liking. I’ve swabbed 
away every trace of the former tenants and everything 
is fresh and new.” 

“I wish I could have helped.” 

“Oh, but you did, by sitting quietly here and getting 
better, to say nothing of a wave of the hand now and 
then.” 

“That was not doing much when you were working . 
like a ” 

“Like a nigger. I looked like one too till I’d had 


248 


MAID OF THE MIST 


that swim. Now I’ll get supper ready, and tomorrow 
we’ll flit, and you’ll be able to walk about on an even 
keel without any danger of falling.” 

He helped her down to the cabin and their very close 
quarters at the bottom of the slope, and set to work 
preparing their evening meal. And the more incon- 
gruous his occupations and the more menial his tasks, 
the more The Girl’s heart warmed towards him. 


XLIX 

In the morning, as soon as they had eaten, he got the 
raft round to the lower side of the ship, ruthlessly 
hacked out a section of the bulwarks so that she could 
step down with the smallest possible exertion, and took 
her across to the new house. 

Getting her on board without shock to the broken 
arm was not so easy. He moored the raft, stem and 
stern, and braced it tight so that it could not move. 
Then he built on it a pyramid of three empty boxes, 
forming steps up which she could climb high enough to 
grip his strong hand reaching down through the gap in 
the side and so be drawn safely up on to the deck, which 
he had swabbed with sand and water till it was cleaner 
than it had been for years. 

‘Tt is nice to be able to walk on the flat of one’s feet 
again,” she said, and he led her down below to a cabin 
gorgeous as an Eastern room with drapings of amber 
silk and blue, and every bit of woodwork scoured as 
clean as elbow-grease could make it. 

“It is delightful,” she said fervidly. “How you must 
have slaved at it !” 

“And how I enjoyed doing it!” 

There was a new sand hearth, nicely banked up be- 
tween planks pegged upright on the floor, and a pile of 
wood on it ready for lighting. He lit a match with his 


MAID OF THE MIST 249 

flint and steel, and handed it to her as before, so that 
she might start the first fire in the new home. 

“You will take your old room,” he said. “Then if 
we should topple over again you won’t be able to fall 
out of your bunk. Now I’ll go back and bring over all 
our belongings. I made a complete clearance here, ex- 
cept some of the stores which we can use,” and before 
mid-day he had everything transferred and stowed 
away. 

He spent most of the afternoon weaving in and out 
of their rusty cable lengths of the least-rotten rope he 
could lay hands on, in order to strengthen it and stop 
its chafing as much as possible. But below water he 
could not go beyond a foot or two, and the lower links 
he had to leave to Providence. 

As he worked. The Girl paced the deck, rejoicing in 
its horizontality, and came each time to lean over the 
bows and watch him and say a lively word or two. And, 
if any had been there to see, it would have been difficult 
to believe that two such cheerful people were, to the 
very best of their belief, condemned by an inscrutable 
fate to imprisonment for life on this lonely sandbank, — 
to a confinement as solitary in some respects, and in the 
prospect of escape as hopeless, as that of the Bastille 
itself. 

But — they were together; and Adam and Eve, cast 
out of the Garden, could still make a home in the wil- 
derness and turn the joys that were left them to fullest 
account. 


L 

He was up betimes next morning, and had fish for their 
breakfast before she came out of her room, and, more- 
over, had made cakes and full provision for all her 
needs during the day. 

“I shall go out there at once,” he said. “You will 


250 


MAID OF THE MIST 


not mind being left? I want to get in everything we 
shall need for the winter as soon as possible.” 

‘T am sorry not to be able to help, but I shall be 
quite all right here. You will . . .” she began, with a 
quite novel access of timidity, and finished with a rush, 
— “you will be very careful. I am rather fearful of 
that horrid wreckage. If you never came back ” 

“I will be very careful, and I will certainly come back 
— laden, I hope, with good things,” and he went off on 
the raft, and she stood watching and waving her hand 
at times when he turned, until he disappeared along the 
spit. And as he went his heart beat high, for he did not 
believe that her fears were chiefly for herself, although 
she had made it appear so. 

He found the wreckage considerably altered. The 
gale had swept it bare of all traces of their previous 
peckings and nibblings, and had piled and stuffed it 
with tempting-looking new plunder. And with things 
less attractive. Whatever had been left of the mate had 
disappeared, hurled down probably into some black 
crack. But, during the day, in various crannies he 
came on no less than three drowned men, partly dressed 
in what appeared to him naval uniform, anyway not in 
the usual slops of the merchant service. And they set 
him thinking how narrow, yet how sharp, was the divid- 
ing line between themselves and the outer world. 

He built his raft as usual and toiled all day, smash- 
ing his way through scores of boxes, cases, seamen’s 
chests, and rooting in them as eagerly as ever did the 
mate, but with a different spirit within him. 

First he gathered indispensable stores, and practice 
had by this time so perfected his eye that he could tell 
almost at a glance what a cask or box contained, how 
long it had been afloat, and what damage its contents 
were likely to have suffered. 

Many odd, and some extraordinary and incompre- 
hensible, things his hasty search brought to light. It 


MAID OF THE MIST 


251 


was indeed an absorbing inquisition into, an endless 
revelation of, the ruling passions and frailties of the 
human heart. 

Little hoards of money and jewelry were his com- 
monest finds, pitiful now in view of their uselessness to 
those who had gathered them. But he would take from 
the pile nothing but what it rightly owed them, means 
of life and the tempering of its hard conditions, and he 
left all these untouched. Tobacco and pipes, and flints 
and steel, were lawful plunder. 

One brass-bound chest he broke open and found 
great store of women’s clothing, rich with lace and 
finely wrought even to the eyes of a man. The Girl 
might find that useful and he began to make a selection, 
with the eyes of her delight dancing before him as he 
did so. Then with a start, and a sharp breath of 
amazement, he straightened up for a moment, crammed 
everything back into the chest, and hauled it to the 
edge of the pile and hurled it into the sea. For there, 
at the bottom, wedged tight among all these delicate 
draperies was the body of a new-born child, strangled 
at its birth, as he knew by the look of it. 

Bundles of letters, papers which might be of highest 
import to waiting friends, anxious heirs, business 
houses, he found in places, but left them as they were. 

He came on another box containing women’s clothes, 
of plainer material and simpler make, and rooted care- 
fully after the characer of its owner before deciding to 
take some back for The Girl. It seemed above suspi- 
cion, and he rejoiced to be able to supply some of her 
more pressing needs. Clothes for himself the wreckage 
had always been generous of, but to come upon two 
chests of women’s things in one day was extraordinary. 
They had at times searched far and wide and anxiously, 
and never lighted on one. 

He got back with his load, and in two journeys from 
the spit got it all on board, before it was too dark for 


252 


MAID OF THE MIST 


his reward in The Girl’s exuberant joy at the things he 
had brought for her. 

“Shoes! . . . stockings! . . . Some proper needles 
and thread! . . . and oh, but I am glad to see these 
other things ! . . . I was washing some of my things 
while you were away, but it was not easy with one hand 
. . . And another brush and comb ! . . . and scissors ! 
If we can clean them I can cut your hair for you.” 

“I shall be grateful. I feel like a savage. I’ll clean 
them all right.” 

“And did you make any strange discoveries?” she 
asked, while they sat at supper, as one asks news of the 
outer world from a traveller. 

“Oh, heaps. Jewels and money, and papers, letters 
and so on ” 

“They might be interesting, — in winter days.” 

“I had not thought of that. I’ll bring you an armful 
tomorrow.” 

“You will go again tomorrow.^” 

“I must go till I think we have enough for the win- 
ter’s siege. There may be weeks when I can’t get out 
there. This storm brought in a mighty pile of stuff 
and it’s best to get it while it’s in good condition. Do 
you want more clothes if I can find them?” 

“A woman never has too many,” she laughed. “But 
don’t waste time searching for them. I can manage 
very well, especially now that I have needles and 
thread.” 

“I just smash open each box as I come to it. One 
never knows what one may come upon. Their contents 
are as different as their owners. I have been trying to 
imagine them from their belongings.” 

He wrought at the pile for many days, and she filled 
in the time at home by evaporating endless pans of wa- 
ter over the fire to get the salt, and managed to accu- 
mulate quite a fair supply. 

He brought over for her amusement a great bundle 


MAID OF THE MIST 


253 


of written papers which she was too busy to delve into 
at the moment, all her time being given to salt-making. 
And then one day he returned exultant with some great 
lumps of rock salt, such as cattle love to lick, and her 
little efforts were like to be put in the shade. But he 
averred that her salt was infinitely the finer to a culti- 
vated taste and they would use it only on very special 
occasions. 

He brought her too a quantity of oatmeal in cases, 
and — treasure-trove indeed — a dozen cans of the oil 
used for ships’ lights. He searched in vain for a lan- 
tern, but felt sure he could turn that oil to account in 
some way during the long winter nights. From the 
marks on the cases in the neighbourhood of these dis- 
coveries, and the superior quality of some of their con- 
tents, he thought a warship must have gone down not 
very far away. 

His belief was confirmed by finding other unusual 
supplies in the same place, and he worked at it for days 
until there was hardly a case or box or barrel which he 
had not tapped. 

One of his greatest finds was a handful of spare tools, 
in a chest that had probably belonged to a ship’s car- 
penter — an auger, a gimlet, a chisel, a screwdriver, and 
a small piece of sharpening hone. And that same day 
he lighted on an unpretentious little box, stoutly made 
of deal, which had swelled with the water to the partial 
protection of its contents. A glance inside showed him 
how great was this treasure, and he carried it at once 
to his raft and bestowed it with care. 

When he opened the little deal case on deck that 
evening The Girl gave a joyful cry, “Books! Oh, but 
I am glad, and the winter nights will not be long ! Let 
me see them all quickly. — “Poems,” by Robert Burns. 
“Life of Samuel Johnson,” by James Boswell. The 
Book of Common Prayer. “Decline and Fall of the 
Roman Empire,” by Edward Gibbon, Vol. 1. “The 


254 ) 


MAID OF THE MIST 


Vicar of Wakefield,” by Oliver Goldsmith. “Tristram 
Shandy,” by Laurence Sterne. “The Castle of 
Otranto,” by Horace Walpole. The Annual Register 
— one, two, three volumes. “Tom Jones,” by Henry 
Fielding. “Clarissa Harlowe,” by Samuel Richardson. 
Cruden’s Concordance. Hymns by Rev. Isaac Watts, 
D.D. A Bible. One, two, three volumes of sermons. 
John Bunyan’s “Pilgrim’s Progress” and “Holy War,” 
and Foxe’s “Book of Martyrs”! Oh, we shall do fa- 
mously. Now what do you make of the owner of this 
fine thing .P” she challenged him merrily. 

“A parson, I should say. They are the greatest read- 
ers. But that is easily seen,” and he turned to the fly- 
leaves of several of the volumes and found them all in- 
scribed with the same name, ‘James Elwes, Esq. m.a. 
Fellow of Brasenose College, Oxford.’ 

“Good Mr Elwes I I am sorry he is drowned, but I 
am grateful to him for taking his books with him when 
he travelled, and leaving them behind him when he went. 
That is the greatest find yet,” said she. 

“We won’t despise the lower things. All the same 
Pm glad to have the books.” 

“They will be a wonderful help. Let us dry them at 
once. They are more precious than jewels,” and he got 
her soft cloths, and they carefully mopped up and 
wiped over every volume and promised them they should 
be set in the sun to complete their cure on the morrow. 

“And those horrid birds she asked, as they worked. 
“You had no trouble from them.?” 

“They were all too busy elsewhere. There is grain 
enough floating about there to feed a city. They will 
be plump and happy birds for some time to come. They 
were too busy even to quarrel and they never so much 
as looked my way.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


255 


LI 

As though exhausted by its late violence, or needing 
rest before renewing it, the weather continued mild and 
open except for occasional mists. 

Thanks to her own caution and Wulfrey’s assiduous 
attention. The Girl’s arm was going on well, and she 
was looking forward eagerly to being an active member 
of society again. 

“You see, I have never been laid up in my life be- 
fore,” she said, “and it is unnatural to me. A dozen 
times a day I have to stop that wretched arm when it 
wants to do something.” 

“A very little longer and it shall do what it wants, 
within reason. Let me rub it again for you.” 

“You are a great believer in rubbing,” she said, with 
reminiscent smiles, as she surrendered the arm to him, 
and he rubbed it gently and tirelessly to keep the sinews 
and muscles from stiffening. 

“I have found great virtue in it, and great reward,” 
he smiled back. 

He took her ashore almost every day, and they ram- 
bled far along the northern beach and enjoyed the 
soft autumnal days to the full. But all the time his 
thoughts were on the coming winter whose rigours he 
had no means of forecasting. And so, like a wise man, 
he made such provision as was possible for the worst. 

He set her to gathering and drying every herb she 
deemed suitable for seasoning purposes. And he him- 
self caught very many fish and split them open and 
dried them in the sun as he had read was done elsewhere. 
He tried some rabbits in the same way, but they did 
not take to it and had to be used for bait. 

And, after a few days’ rest from his exertions at the 
wreckage, he set to work on building a house on shore, 
in case anything should happen to the ‘Jane and Mary,’ 


256 


MAID OF THE MIST 


or they should find solid ground preferable to water 
during the winter gales. 

He had for a long time past secured every nail he 
could knock out of the old timbers, and regarded them 
as most precious possessions. The finding of the auger 
and gimlet opened up wider possibilities. Where nails 
are scarce, a hole and a peg may take their place. 
Wood he had in superfluity, for the remains of every 
raft that had brought cargo from the pile lay strewn 
about the spit, in some cases hurled half-way across it 
by the waves that broke there in the storm times. 

Where best to build was a matter not easily decided. 
They would need all the sunshine obtainable. But all 
the heaviest gales came from the south and west and 
from these they wanted shelter. And they must be 
within easy reach of the fresh-water pools and not too 
far from the ship, where their supplies would be mostly 
stored. 

After much discussion they fixed on an odd little 
hollow — a mere cup in the centre of three sandhills of 
size, which stood close together and moreover were well 
matted with wire-grass and looked too solid to whirl 
away in a gale as the smaller hills constantly did. 

To the south-west of these stood the largest hill in 
the neighbourhood, and this would break the force of 
the gales in that direction. The water-pools lay out in 
the sandy plain just beyond this hill. 

Wulf entered on the building of this first house he 
had ever attempted, with the gusto of a schoolboy. 

“I feel about fourteen,” he laughed, as he detailed 
his ideas to her. 

“So do I, — except this wretched arm, which is one 
hundred and five.” 

“We’ll soon have it back to fourteen. You see, if I 
can carve out the sides of those three smaller hills, and 
back our house into each of them, it will make im- 
hensely for solidity and warmth. No gale can blow 


MAID OF THE MIST 


1 257 


through a sandhill, though they do waltz about now and 
again. But these seem fairly well set and fixed. I’ll 
start on it tomorrow. I wish I had a spade and a saw. 
I can chop out some kind of a spade from a plank, 
maybe, but, lacking a saw, the house will be a bit 
rough, I’m afraid.” 

“That doesn’t matter as long as it stands up and 
keeps us warm.” 

“Oh, I’ll guarantee it will stand up and keep you 
warm.” 

“Can you make a chimney 

“I’ve been thinking of that. I will run four boards 
up through a hole in the roof, and we must try to in- 
duce the smoke to go up. There is no clay here, you 
see, nor stone, — nothing but sand.” 

The site settled, he set to work at once rafting his 
timber across the lake from the spit, and then hauling 
it across the sandy plain past the fresh-water pools, 
and this gave him a full week’s hard labour. Some of 
the lighter planks he let The Girl drag across, since she 
insisted on having at all events one hand in the work. 
The heavier ones were as much as he could handle him- 
self. In his rest times, and after supper of a night, he 
whittled pegs till he had an ample supply, and sharp- 
ened his axes with the bit of hone he had found in the 
carpenter’s chest. 

With his axe he hacked out a rude spade from a 
plank, and trimmed the handle and the point with his 
knife; and then he set to work on his three sandhills, 
cutting down the side of each where it rounded down 
into the cup-like hollow, and flinging the sand into the 
cup itself to make a level floor. 

The building of such a house was entirely new to him, 
but he had brains and he bent them all to every prob- 
lem that presented itself, and never failed to find the 
way out. For instance, — the space he wished his house 
to occupy between the sandhills was quite twelve feet in 


258 


MAID OF THE MIST 


width, and his planks ran mostly to six or eight feet 
only. There must therefore be a row of posts in the 
middle, with one or more beams on top as a ridge-pole, 
from which he could carry side pieces to the walls six 
feet away on either side, and he had foreseen some diffi- 
culty in fixing these posts absolutely rigid in the yield- 
ing sand. If they wobbled or gave in any direction his 
roof would be in danger. 

But before he began carving down his sand-slopes he 
had settled that point. He selected his uprights, the 
longest and strongest in his stock, chipped thorn to size, 
and to the end of each pegged tsout flat cross-pieces, 
boring the holes with his auger and driving home the 
pegs with the back of his axe. These he set up in a line 
in the middle of the hollow, standing upright on their 
cross-piece feet. Then, as he carved down his slope, 
every spadeful of sand buried the cross-pieces deeper, 
till, when he had finished, they were under two feet of 
well-trampled sand and he looked upon their rigidity as 
a personal triumph. 

That was surely as extraordinary a house as was ever 
built by a man who knew nothing whatever about build- 
ings. It took him five full weeks and he enjoyed every 
minute of it. And so did The Girl, for she sat in the 
sun, watching all his cheerful activities with envious 
eyes because she was so unable to share them, discussing 
points with him as they arose, giving suggestions and 
advice which he always adopted when they chimed with 
his own, and approving heartily of all he did. 

‘T wish I could help,” — how many times she said it, 
and thought it very many more. “It is disgusting to 
have to sit and watch while you work like a — like a 
galley-slave.” 

“Galley-slaves don’t build houses — not such houses 
as this anyway. There never was such a house before,” 
he laughed. “Besides, you help more than you know by 


MAID OF THE MIST 


259 


simply sitting there and approving of it. ‘They also 
serve,’ you know, ‘who only sit and watch.’ ” 

“Who says that?” 

“One John Milton, — not quite in those words, but the 
meaning is the same. As a matter of fact, he had, I 
believe, just gone blind when he said it and was feeling 
rather out of it. Your arm will soon be all right again. 
It’s doing famously.” 

Truly a wonderful house, not so much because of the 
quaint way in which its difficulties were surmounted or 
evaded — which alone might have given an ordinary 
builder nightmares for the rest of his life, but more 
especially by reason of the rose-golden thoughts which 
swept at times like flame through hearts and minds of 
both watcher and builder as they wrought. If all those 
glowing thoughts could have transmuted themselves 
into visible adornment of that rough little home no 
fairy palace could have vied with it. 

For ever and again — and mostly ever — in his heart — 
helping the auger as it bored and the axe as it ham- 
mered the pegs well home — was the thought that was 
radiant enough and mighty enough to transform that 
desolate bank of sand into a veritable Garden of Eden ; 
— “If no rescue comes, here we shall live — she and I — 
together, — one in heart and soul and body, and here, 
maybe, we shall die. But death is a long way off, and 
Love lives on forever. I would not exchange my King- 
dom for all the Kingdoms of the earth.” 

And perhaps he would permit himself a foretaste 
from the cup of that intoxicating happiness, in a quick 
caressing glance at her as she sat in the sand nursing 
her arm; and at times she caught those stolen glances, 
for her eyes found great satisfaction in his tireless en- 
ergy and visible enjoyment in his work. 

And she knew as well as if he had told her in words, — 
nay better, for, without a word, the heart speaks louder 
than all the words in the world when it shines through 


260 


MAID OF THE MIST 


honest eyes, — she knew all that possessed him concern- 
ing her, and she was not discomforted thereby. 

She trusted him completely. She had never felt to- 
wards any man as she did to this man. Whatever he 
willed for her would be right. Her whole heart and soul 
rejoiced that he should find such hope and joy in her. 
She was wholly his for the asking, but she knew he 
would not ask it all until he was satisfied in his own 
mind that he was right in asking and she in giving. 

She felt like a wounded bird, sitting below there, 
while her mate built their nest up above. But not, she 
said to herself, like their island birds, for they were 
harsh and cruel, with cold hard eyes, and ever-craving 
hunger in place of hearts. 

That wonderful house, when at last it was finished, 
would have given no satisfaction to the soul of any 
ordinary builder, but to these two it was a monument of 
hard work and difficulties overcome. 

It contained one room twelve feet square in front, 
with two smaller rooms opening out of it at the back. 
The roof sloped slightly from ridge-pole to side-walls 
and was made in four layers — boards side by side below, 
then thick sheets of crimson velvet, an outer shield of 
overlapping planks, and a thick coat of sand and grow- 
ing wire-grass over all. He was hopeful that it would 
withstand the heaviest gales and rains the winter might 
bring. The walls were of stout boards backed up 
against the sandhills, with new sandhills thrown up in 
the intervening spaces, and inside they were draped 
with more crimson velvet, of which they had a large 
supply. The floor was of planks. The door had been 
a troublesome problem, and, lacking hinges, had to be 
lifted bodily in and out of its place. The bay-window 
alongside it was the cabin skylight from the ‘Martha’ 
and this, and the square smoke-shaft of four stout 
boards above the sand hearth, they regarded as crown- 
ing achievements. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


261 


Emboldened by success, and finding enjoyment in the 
development of a craft of which he had never suspected 
himself until now, — experiencing too, to the very fullest, 
the primal blessing of work, he evolved an arm-chair 
for The Girl, out of a barrel that had once held salt 
pork, and when its asperities were softened and hidden 
under voluminous folds of red velvet she assured him 
it was the most comfortable chair she had ever sat in. 

And, for his part, he knew that no girl ever sat in any 
chair that ever was made who could compare with her. 

Beds too he made with some old sail-cloth fitted to 
rough frames, and a table, and their furnishing sufficed, 
though he promised to add to it during the winter. 

The Girl’s arm was well again, though he still urged 
caution in the use of it, and kept a watchful eye on it 
and her ; and never had he felt himself so full of the joy 
and strength of life. When the house was finished, they 
brought over a supply of stores and lived in it for a 
time, and turned the waning autumn days to account by 
long ramblings all over the island, in anticipation of 
the days when ill weather might coop them strictly 
within narrower bounds. 

There were no discoveries to make in land or sea or 
sky, scarcely any in themselves. He felt assured in his 
own mind that she was not unaware of all that he felt 
for her. The fact, the great undeniable fact, that she 
did not seem to resent it, was a deep joy to him. 

Their good-comradeship had known no cloud. She 
was as charmingly frank and gracious as ever. She 
talked away without reserve or constraint of that 
strange past life of hers, which, in every smallest par- 
ticular, was so absolutely the opposite of this one. And 
never once did she display any hankering after Egypt, 
rather seemed to regard this as the Promised Land, or 
at all events the doorway to it. 

Ever and again the possibilities of rescue or escape 
came to the front in their discussions, but grew less and 


262 


' MAID OF THE MIST 


less as the weeks went by. He had been seven months 
on the island, and she four, and save herself, in all that 
time no other living soul had come to it, — unless, as the 
mate had so strenuously held, the bodies of those dis- 
comforting sea-birds were occupied by the souls of 
drowned sailor-men. 

“And you, you know, were a miracle,” he would re- 
mind her. “The chances against you were about a 
thousand to one ” 

“And you were that one.” 

“It was not that I was thinking of ” 

“I never forget it.” 

“This place is undoubtedly shunned, as Macro said. 
It is known as a death-trap. No ship comes here ex- 
cept in pieces. No man comes until he is dead. And 
so, our prospects of rescue or escape are very small, I 
fear. For your sake I wish it were otherwise.” 

“Have I shown signs of discontent, then.?’ I assure 
you I have never been so ... so content to wait and 
hope. It is the most delightful holiday from the world 
I have ever had. . . . Sometime perhaps we shall look 
back upon it as the wide dividing line between the old 
world and the new . . . and between the old life and 
the new.” 

“A line is black as a rule.” 

“It may be light,” she said, and waved her hand ex- 
pressively towards the shimmering golden spear which 
the setting sun sent quivering over the water right up to 
their feet, as they stood watching it on the beach. 

“If we could only walk on it !” she said softly, as the 
red disc swelled and sank and disappeared amid a glory 
of tender lucent greens and blues and glowing orange, 
with a line of crimson fire on the edge of every hovering 
cloud, and a heavenful of crimson flakes and splashes 
smouldering slowly into gray above their heads. 

“It points the road, but we cannot take it,” he said 
quietly, and they turned and went back to the house. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


263 


There were times when she thought he was about to 
tell her all that was in his heart concerning her. She 
could see it in his face and eyes and restless manner. 
And she was ready to respond. 

There were times when it was almost more than he 
could do to keep it all in. He believed she knew. He 
hardly doubted her response. 

But he said to himself, with set jaw and a firmer grip 
of his manhood, — ‘‘She has known me just four months. 
She is here helpless in my hands. I may not press her 
unduly, for she might feel that she could hardly say me 
nay. Her very helplessness must make me the more 
careful and considerate.” 

And more than once, when the desire of his heart was 
leaping to his lips, he jumped up abruptly and went out 
into the night and strode away along the beach. And 
there he would pace to and fro under the quiet stars, 
with the black waves swirling up the shore in long slow 
gleams of shimmering silver, till the peace of it all 
passed into his blood, and presently he would go quietly 
in again, with face and heart toned down to reason- 
ableness. 

And when he went out so. The Girl would smile to 
herself at times, as one who understood. And again, at 
times the smile would slowly fade and she would sit 
thoughtful. But, if she wondered somewhat, and found 
him beyond her complete understanding, she liked him 
none the less for his restraint. 

She was quite happy in their present fellowship, but 
she knew it could not continue so, indefinitely. A man 
always wants more. The woman gives. 

She felt towards this man as she had never felt to- 
wards any man before. Without a word spoken, she 
was satisfied as to the integrity of his intentions, as 
she had never been of any of those who had approached 
her in that old life, and she had been approached by 
many. But the coinage of love about the Court had 


264 


^ MAID OF THE MIST 


grown as debased as did the paper money of the Re- 
public later on. Whispers of love had become but fair 
cloaks for foul deeds. This man had whispered noth- 
ing, but she understood him and held him in honour. 

And she was in no hurry. His love would not burn 
out, or she was much mistaken in him. The flame 
repressed burns brightest in the end. 

And then . . . and then. . . . Well, she sometimes 
laid hold of the future by the ears, as it were, and held 
its changing face while she peered intently into it, and 
endeavoured to read there all that it might mean for 
her. 

Sooner or later he would open his heart to her — and 
that would be the first change. Their relationship 
would of necessity become closer and warmer. She 
would welcome that. It would bring great happiness to 
them both. 

And then — later on — sometime — when all hope of 
rescue or escape had left them ... he would ask still 
more of her. . . . That was inevitable. . . . And in 
her heart, hiding behind a thinning cloud of doubt, 
which had, when first it came upon her, been tinged with 
dismay, she knew he would be right, and that in con- 
senting, she would do no wrong, although it must run 
counter to all her normal views of right and wrong. 

She faced it all squarely and honestly, — Courtship 
properly ends in Marriage. If by this accident of their 
strange fate the regular marriage rites prescribed by 
the law of the land could not take place, they would 
have to content themselves without them. It was in- 
evitable. 

Elemental views of right and wrong were indeed tap- 
rooted in her heart and safe from bruising. But she 
recognised that circumstances alter cases and that 
normal views were out of place here. 

And as to the law of the land — what country claimed 
this bank of sand she did not know. It was a No Man’s 


MAID OF THE MIST 


265 


Land, outside the pale of all laws save God’s and Na- 
ture’s. 

With no man she had ever met, except this man, could 
she have imagined herself considering possibilities such 
as these. But with him she would feel as safe and happy 
as if all the archbishops and bishops in the land had 
performed the ceremony. For, after all, it was only 
man’s law and man’s ceremony; and God’s law and Na- 
ture’s were mightier than these. 

With such thoughts in her — deep thoughts and long 
— she could wait quietly, and she veiled her feelings for 
him lest he should deem her of light mind and too easily 
to be won. 

Now and again, induced perhaps by some adverse 
humour of body or atmosphere, a plaguy little fear 
would leap at her heart and nibble it with sharp teeth, 
— could it be that he had ties in the old life of which 
he had never dared to hint, — some other woman — to 
whom he was bound by honour or by law.^^ 

He had told her much, and yet not very much. Had 
he told her all.?^ Did men ever tell all.f^ He had told her 
much, but there was room in what he had not told for 
anything — for everything. 

But surely he had one time said that he had left no 
ties behind him, — that he was alone. 

If there should be anything of the kind it would 
explain his self-restraint, his quiet service, the looks he 
could not wholly check, the words he did not speak. 

That his heart had gone out to herself she could not 
mistake. But that was not incompatible with ties else- 
where that might keep them apart. 

But fears such as that could not hold her long. They 
had sprung up, in spite of her, once or twice when he 
had jumped up and left her alone, and gone out into 
the night to pace the beach. But when he returned, 
quieted and all himself again, they disappeared at once, 
and her heart was at rest. Wrong and this man had 


266 


MAID OF THE MIST 


nothing in common, she said to herself. She felt as sure 
of his honour as of her own. 


LII 

“This weather cannot last much longer,” he said, one 
night as they sat talking after supper ; he with his pipe, 
which she never would permit him to sacrifice on her 
account, pronouncing the smell of it homely and com- 
fortable, in sipte of his apologies for the varied quali- 
ties of his tobacco. “We must be somewhere near the 
end of October.” 

“It is either the 21st or 22nd or 23rd,” she said very 
definitely. 

“You have kept count.?” 

“Except the time I was on the mast and before I 
came to life again.” 

“Two days probably.” 

“I imagined so. In that case it is the 21st.” 

“And we must be ready for November and bad 
weather. Would you sooner stop here or go back to 
the ‘Jane and Mary’.?” 

“We could not be more comfortable than we are here. 
But I will do whatever you wish.” 

He glanced at her through the wreathing smoke of 
fire and pipe, for nothing they could do would make it 
all go up the chimney. 

Would she say as much if he asked her more.? he won- 
dered. 

Was she ready to be asked.? Or was it still too soon.? 

If he told her all that was in his heart, would he 
startle her out of this most pleasant companionship.? 

She sat gazing quietly into the fire of scraps of old 
ship’s timber. Those leaping tongues of blue and green 
and yellow and crimson flame were a never-failing joy 
to her. Many a curious thing had she seen in them, 


MAID OF THE MIST 267 

and thought many strange thoughts to the tune of their 
merry dance. 

She was winsome beyond words when she sat so, with 
the lights and shadows playing over her face, and about 
the misty dark eyes in which her clear soul dwelt and 
shone without disguisements. 

Suppose he said to her — here and now, — “Avice, 
dearest, do you know what you are to me.? I cannot 
possibly tell you in words, but — do you know.? . . .” 
And she said “I know,” — and said again, “I will do 
whatever you wish. . . .” 

Ah — God ! ... If that could be he would ask no 
more of life. . . . One word from her and this bare 
bank would be swept with golden fires ; in the twinkling 
of an eye it would become a Paradise for him and her 
to dwell in. . . . 

If he sat there looking at her it must out. He could 
not keep it in. And why should he .? Why not tell her, 
here and now?” 

He got up quietly and strode out into the night. A 
smile hovered in the corners of her lips, as, without 
looking, she caught sight of his face. Then she rose 
also and stole out after him. 

She was causing him pain when she wished him only 
joy. His thought, she knew, was all for her. She 
would think and act for them both. If he had sat there 
like a pent-up volcano for another second the hot lava 
would have come rushing out. She had felt it all in the 
air. Her heart too was so full of expectant joy that 
the tension was akin to pain. 

It was very dark, with only throbbing stars in a vel- 
vet sky and the white gleam of the foam along the 
beach. She did not know which way he had gone, but 
he would come back presently, all himself again. She 
sank down into the side of a hummock and waited. 

Pie came at last, slowly, heavily, with bent head. 

He stopped quite close to her, where the way led to 


268 


MAID OF THE MIST 


the house, and stood looking out over the darkness of 
the sea. Then he heaved a great sigh and turned to go 
back to the house. 

“God!” she heard him mutter. “If I dared but tell 
her 1” 

She rose swiftly out of her form and caught him by 
the arm, with something between a laugh and a cry, 
“Tell me, then I” and the mighty arms of his love were 
round her, gripping her to him till she was squeezed 
almost breathless. 

“A vice ! Avice I — and you knew 1 Oh, thank God 
for you!” 

“Of course I knew,” she gasped. “And I want you 
as much as you want me.” 

“Thank God for you, dearest !” he said deeply. “We 
will thank Him all our lives. He has given us with a 
full hand. ... I have nothing left to ask Him . . . 
except your fullest happiness, now and always.” 

“And I yours. You are my happiness. You give me 
Heaven.” 

“God requite me ten times over if ever you rue this 
day. I have longed for you till my heart was sick with 
the pain of longing ” 

“Foolish! Why did you not tell me before.?^” 

“I could not. Until I knew. . . . Placed as we are, 
you see, it felt like forcing you. . . .You might not 
have felt free to say no ... It might have put an end 
to all our comradeship. . . .” 

“You don’t know me. I’d have said no quickly 
enough if I hadn’t wanted you. But I do, and you 
make me very happy.” 

He led her into the house and held her there at arm’s 
length in the firelight, as though he could hardly be- 
lieve it all true, and looked deep into the dark eyes and 
rosy face and kissed it rosier still. 

And the blue and yellow and green and crimson 
flames danced their merriest, as these two sat hand in 


MAID OF THE MIST 269 

hand watching them, and talking softly by snatches 
with long sweet silences in between. 


LIII 

“I WAS SO afraid there might be some other to whom 
you were bound,” she said, as she lay there in the fire- 
light, with her head against his arm and his right hand 
smoothing her hair, that wonderful hair which had been 
to him as the aureole of a saint and was more to him 
now than all the gold in all the world. 

“There is no other, my dear one. Not a soul on 
earth has any claim on me except that of friendship. 
... It was inevitable that we should both have that 
fear. Four months ago we did not know of one an- 
other’s existence ” 

“Isn’t it wonderful?” she murmured. “I wonder if 
we had never met if you would have found someone 
else ” 

“Never anyone to fill my heart as you do. I cannot 
even imagine it.” 

“And if I should have found someone else?” 

“That is possible, but no one who could feel for you 
all that I do, or could want you as much as I do. You 
are to me the one supreme good,” and the clasp of his 
arm told her even more than his words. 

“You do not ask me if I had any ties in the old life 
” she began. 

“You would not be lying in my arm like this if there 
were. I know you too well.” 

“That is true and I thank you. It is good to be 
taken on trust. But indeed there were none. The men 
one met there — faugh ! — they were masquers, puppets, 
dandies ; — some had brains, but few had hearts, and 
they were most dreadful liars. Such talents as they 
possessed were devoted to finesse and intrigue, and the 


270 MAID OF THE MIST 

turning of everything to their own satisfaction and 
advantage.” 

“Thank God you are out of it all.” 

“Yes, I do thank God, — for the shipwreck and 
everything else, but chiefly that He sent you here to 
meet me and took that other one away.” 

The weather held still for a few days, and he spent 
them in providing for her future comfort in every way 
he could think of. 

He chopped logs enough to last them through the 
winter, and piled them in stacks about the house. He 
got over from the ship supplies in abundance. As the 
result of much labour and many failures he constructed 
a primitive lamp out of the silver mug from which 
Macro used to swill his rum. He distorted a beak out 
of one side of it, and contrived a wick which passed 
through a hole in a piece of beaten copper, and if the 
light was not brilliant it was at all events steadier to 
read by than the dancing flames. 

He had lighted quite by accident on Macro’s hidden 
hoard in the hold of the ‘Jane and Mary.’ He was 
rooting in a corner there for his knife, which had 
worked out its sheath at his back as he hoisted out pro- 
visions, and found it sticking point downwards in a 
plank. As he pulled it out, the plank gave slightly, 
and lifting it he found, underneath, the useless treasure. 

He wanted none of it, was indeed loth to touch it, 
but, on consideration, took out two more silver mugs 
for their daily service and half a dozen gold pins and 
brooches for Avice’s use, since she was always needing 
such things and regretting her lack of them. 

The long spell of mild soft weather — which had come 
at last to have in it a sense of sickness and decay — 
broke up in the wildest storm they had yet seen. 

The birds came whirling in in a shrieking cloud, but 
the wind out-shrieked them. It shrilled above their 
heads in a ceaseless strident scream like the yelling of 


MAID OF THE MIST 


271 


souls in torment. It shook their protecting sandhills 
and made their house shiver right down to the buried 
cross-pieces of its pillars. It picked up the smaller 
hummocks outside and set them waltzing along the 
shore. It heaped a foot of new sand on their roof and 
sent a cartload of it down the chimney. 

But their position had been well chosen. The more 
the sand piled on their house and against it, the tighter 
it became. Then the rain came down in sheets and tor- 
rents, but no drop came through, except down the chim- 
ney, and that Wulf presently plugged with a blanket 
and let the smoke find its way out through an inch of 
opened door, which he had purposely placed to lee- 
ward, as all their great storms came from the south 
and south-west. 

But the change of atmosphere was bracing, and with 
solid sand under their feet, and assured of the safety of 
their house, they welcomed it and felt the better for it. 

After the first day’s confinement he must out to see, 
and she would not stay behind. So they rigged them- 
selves in oldest garments and fewest possible and 
started out. 

They were drenched to the skin in a second and 
whirled away like leaves the instant they forsook the 
cover of their hollow. 

Avice was being carried bodily towards their nearest 
shore. He feared she would go headlong into the sea 
and started wildly after her. He saw her throw her- 
self fiat and grip at the sand, but she was broadside 
on to the merciless wind and it bowled her over and over? 
and rolled her along like a ball. It carried him along 
in ten-feet leaps. He flung himself down beside her, 
put his arm round her, wrenched her head to the gale, 
and they lay there breathless, she choking hysterically 
with paroxysms of laughter. 

It took them an hour, crawling like moles, to get back 
to the shelter of the hills. He would have had her go 


272 


MAID OF THE MIST 


in, but she would not hear of it. They could hear the 
booming thunder of the great waves on the spit even 
above the wind, and she must see them. 

So they set off once more, flat to the sand, and 
worked round in time to the breast of the great hill near 
the fresh-water pools, and lay in it, safe from dislodg- 
ment unless the hill went too. 

They could only peer through pinched eyes, and then 
only with their hands over them, into the teeth of that 
wind, but, even so, the sight was magnificent and ap- 
palling. The grim gray sky and the grim gray sea met 
just beyond the spit, and out of that close sky the huge 
gray waves burst, high as houses, — whole streets of 
houses rushing headlong to destruction. They curved 
gloriously to their fall with a glint of muddy green be- 
low and all their crests abristle with white foam-fury. 
Right out of the sky they came, right up to the sky they 
seemed to reach, flinging up at it great white spouts of 
spray like flouting curses, towering high above the land, 
crashing down upon it with a thunderous roar which 
thinned the voice of the wind to no more than a shrill 
piping. 

Their own land-locked lake was lashed into fury also. 
The flying crests of the outer waves came rocketing 
over in wild white splashes. He was not sure that some 
of the waves themselves did not cover the spit and come 
roaring into it. The ‘ J ane and Mary’ danced wildly to 
her cable. He wondered if it would hold. The 
‘Martha,’ more than ever on her beam-ends, was being 
pounded like a drum. 

“Did you feel that?” he shouted in her ear, and she 
nodded, with a touch of fear in her wind-blown face. 
For, under the impact of one vast mountainous ava- 
lanche, the very ground on which they lay seemed to 
shake like a jelly, and the whole island shuddered. 

“It cannot wash it all away, can it?” she gasped, 
when they had wormed their way back to shelter. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


273 


“It never has done yet anyway,” he said cheerfully, 
as he squeezed windy tears out of his smarting eyes. 
“Now, dear, change all your things at once. We are 
wet through to the bone.” 

“It was very wonderful. I wouldn’t have missed it 
for anything. But I’m glad we’re ashore,” and she 
slipped away into her own room. 

That was the first of the winter storms, and there 
were many like it. But they bore them equably. They 
were in splendid health, the weather at its worst was 
never very cold, indeed the gales were more to their 
taste than the smothering chill of the frequent fogs. 
They had all they needed, — food and fire, and light and 
books, a weather-tight house, and one another. 

If they lacked much of what their former life had 
taught them to consider necessary, they had more than 
all that former life had given them, and they were 
happy. 


LIV 

Between the storms and fog-spells, they tramped to 
and fro discovering the changes wrought in their island, 
and many a strange thing their wanderings showed 
them. 

One great gale which lasted a full week strewed the 
south-west Point with wreckage as thickly almost as the 
great pile beyond. Their hearts ached at thought of 
the still greater loss it represented, of which the proofs 
were never lacking. The chaotic bristle was studded 
with the bodies of the drowned, and the sight sent them 
home sorrowfully, yet marvelling the more at their own 
deliverance, and still more grateful for it. 

“We are miracles, without a doubt,” said Wulf 
gravely, as they went back home. “No one else gets 
here alive, you see. ... I was the first miracle. Macro 
was the second,” and he told her what she had not 


274 


MAID OF THE MIST 


known before, how he had contrived to save the mate, 
and of his regret that it had not been old Jock Steele 
the carpenter, who would have been a blessing to them 
instead of a curse. ‘‘And you are the third and best 
miracle of all,” he said, clasping her arm more tightly 
under his own. “God! what a difference it has made!” 
he said fervently. “Alone here one plight go mad. In 
time one most certainly would. See how good a work 
you are occomplishing by simply remaining alive. In- 
stead of being a melancholy madman you make me the 
happiest man on earth. Oh, the God-given wonder of a 
woman ! Truly you are the greatest miracle of all, and 
He has been good to me.” 

“And to me. If you had not been here I should have 
been dead and we would never have met. Perhaps He 
sent us to one another.” 

“I’m sure He did, and all our lives we’ll thank Him 
for it,” and so the sight of the dead but put a keener 
edge on their gratitude for life and their joy in one an- 
other. 

The next big storm washed the point clean again. 
All had gone, wreckage, bodies, everything, and the 
great pile beyond bristled higher than ever. 

“Do you notice anything strange.?” he asked her, as 
they stood looking out at it. 

“There seems more of it.” 

“And not a bird to be seen. They’ve all gone fof the 
winter, I expect. We shall not see them again till next 
year.” 

“I am glad. They are evil things. Our Paradise is 
sweeter without them,” and he kissed her for the word. 

The weird forces of the gales, however, afforded them 
many surprises. 

Tramping round the further end of their lake one 
day, they saw changes in the great stretch of sand that 
ran out of sight towards the eastern point. What had 
been a level plain was scored and furrowed as by a 


MAID OF THE MIST 


275 


mighty ploughshare. It was like a rough sea whose 
tumbling waves had in an instant been turned into sand 
— league-long grooves with high-piled ridges between, 
and in the hollows the watery sun glinted briefly here 
and there on shining white objects sticking out of the 
sand. 

‘‘Bones !” said Wulf in surprise, as they stood looking 
into the first hollow, and he jumped down and picked 
up a human skull. 

“Horrid !” said Avice. “And there’s another, and 
another over there. It’s a regular grave-yard.” 

“A battle-field, I should say,” as he examined them 
one after another. “This is very curious. This fellow 
was killed by a bullet through the head. Here’s the hole. 
And this one’s skull was split with an axe or a sword. 
This one also. I. wonder what it all means. . . .” 

“Pirates and murderers. That’s what they look 
like.” 

“I shouldn’t wonder. . . . Here’s an ancient cutlass.” 

“And what’s this.^” — rooting at something with her 
foot. . . . “An old pistol! . . . and the hilt of an- 
other sword! ... I wonder if they were the men who 
lived on our ships.” 

“Maybe. But I think these things are older than the 
ships. . . . Why — the place is thick with them,” as 
they wandered on. “There must be scores of them, and 
more still underneath the ridges, no doubt. . . . There 
was no lack of life here at one time evidently ” 

“And death !” 

“Yes, and death without a doubt. A good thing for 
us, perhaps, that customers such as these don’t fre- 
quent it now.” 

“I’m glad we live at the other end. You haven’t 
found any bones there, have you?” 

“Not a bone! They’re not very cheerful company. 
Let us hope the next gale will cover them up again.” 

Further on, in another trench, they found one side of 


276 


MAID OF THE MIST 


a boat, mouldered almost into the similitude of the sand 
in which it had been embedded for very many years. 
And, further along still,. Wulf thought he could make 
out the stark ribs of ships like those on the outer banks 
at their own end of the island. But they were very far 
away and held out no mducement to closer investiga- 
tion, and Avice had had^ enough of such things for the 
time being. 

There were spells of bad weather, when, for days at a 
time, they scarcely ventured out except to get in wood 
or fetch water from the pools, which always meant a 
thorough soaking. 

But they were completely happy in one another’s 
company, and ever more grateful for the Providence 
that had cast their lot together. 

The days slipped by without one weary hour. 
Shrewder and subtler proving of hearts and tempera- 
ments could hardly be conceived. But they stood the 
test perfectly, never thought of it as such, found in 
their present estate nothing but cause for joy and 
deepest thankfulness. 

The depth and warmth of his love for her expressed 
itself in most devoted service and tenderest care, and 
hers for him in so frank and implicit a confidence that 
he felt it an uplifting honour to be so favoured. Indeed 
the man who could have betrayed so great a trust must 
have been lowest of the low and basest of his kind. 

“I can’t help wondering sometimes whether we would 
have felt like this to one another if we had met in an 
ordinary way, outside there,” she said musingly, one 
night, as she lay in the hollow of his arm, watching the 
coloured flames. 

“Yes,” he said emphatically. “For you laid hold of 
my heart as soon as I set eyes on you. It got tangled 
first in the meshes of your hair, and in your long eye- 
lashes, and the thing I wanted most was to see what 
your eyes were like. They were wells of mystery.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 


277 


“And — they were right?” she laughed softly. 

“They were exactly right and just what I had hoped. 
Large and dark and eloquent and tender and true 
and ” 

“Dear ! dear ! If I had known such an inquisition 
was going I should have been afraid to open them.” 
“Ah, you didn’t know me, you see.” 

“I didn’t know you, but I knew I was all right as 
soon as I saw you. I knew I could trust you. . . . 
How strange and wonderful it all was !” 


LV 

One strange and terrible experience they had when the 
winter was almost over, and it came within measurable 
distance of making an end of them both. 

Depending on their reserve stock of flour on board 
the ‘Jane and Mary,’ they had used freely what they 
had on shore. When he opened the other he found to 
his dismay that it must have been more damaged at 
first than he imagined. It was nearly all mouldy and 
smelt badly. He had run short of tobacco also, and so 
decided to go over to the pile for supplies on the first 
possible day. 

The worst of the storms seemed over. They had oc- 
casional brisk gleaming days in between times, and on 
one such, after seeing that Avice had all she would need 
in his absence, they set off along the northern shore. 

She wanted to go out with him, but he dissuaded her 
from that. The crossing would be very different from 
what it was in the summer and he would not have her 
exposed to it. Besides, he intended to make only a 
short job of it, just get what he wanted, and be back 
almost before she knew he had gone. She was so loth to 
be parted from him, however, even for that short time, 
that she insisted on walking with him to the point and 


278 MAID OF THE MIST 

said she would sit there and wait till she saw him on his 
way back. 

So she sat down in the sand and drew her blanket 
cloak about her, and watched him wade and swim and at 
last scramble up on to the pile. He waved his hand to 
her and then set to work constructing a raft as usual. 

She saw him climbing to and fro among the wreckage, 
smashing away at casks and cases, and then, to her 
dismay, he and the pile and the gaunt wrecks beyond 
disappeared completely, wiped out by a bank of mist 
that had come sweeping in from the sea. The sun still 
shone up above, but intermittently. Dark clouds came 
rushing up out of the south and presently it too was 
hidden. The wind blew gustily and increased in vio- 
lence every minute. 

She wished he had not gone. She could do no good 
by stopping there, but she did not care to go home. 
Behind her, on the southern shore, the waves were be- 
ginning to break with the short harsh sounds that por- 
tended storm. 

Perhaps he would leave his work and swim across. 
He would know she was waiting for him. She must wait 
till he came. She drew her blanket over her head and 
sat there, huddled up with her back to the wind, and 
hoped and prayed. For, if this sudden storm should 
work up into a gale and last, she would be full of fears 
for his safety. 

Suppose he should be drowned! What that awful 
pile would be like in bad weather she dared not think. 

She prayed wildly for his life, — ‘‘Oh God, spare him 
to me ! He is all I have I Spare him 1 Have pity oh us 
both I Spare him I Spare him 1” — over and over again 
the same ultimate cry, for her mind was closed to every 
other thought but this, that the man she loved more 
than anything on earth was out there in peril of his life. 

She stayed there, drenched by the rain and flailed by 


MAID OF THE MIST 279 

the wind, till it began to grow dark, and then she crept 
wearily home like a broken bird. 

Grim fear gripped her heart like an icy hand, but she 
would not despair entirely. He was so strong and 
capable. He might have tried and found it impossible 
to get back. He might come in at any minute. 

If he were here the first thing he would have told her 
was to change into dry clothes. She changed, and 
made up the fire and put on the kettle. He would be 
cold and hungry when he came. She must be ready for 
him. 

Out there on the wreckage, Wulf had been so hard at 
work that he noticed no sign of change in the weather, 
till the clammy mist swept over him and blotted out 
everything but the box he was delving into. 

The winter storms had wrought great changes in the 
pile. It seemed thicker and higher and more chaotic 
than ever, bristling with new stuff which he would have 
liked to investigate, in case it should contain anything 
that would add to Avice’s comfort. 

But first, to find some decent flour, and, as it hap- 
pened, there seemed fewer barrels about than usual, and 
most of them had suffered in their rough transit. The 
search for a good one took time. Such as he found 
were gaping and he did not trouble to open them. 
However, he discovered one at last, opened it to make 
sure of the goodness of its heart and then turned to 
seek tobacco. 

It was then that the fog swept down on him and 
chained him to three square feet or so of precarious 
foothold. Trespass beyond that limit might mean a 
broken limb or neck, for the surface of the pile was 
seamed with ragged rifts and chasms, in which the tide 
whuffled and growled like a wild beast anticipating food. 

So he rooted away in the chest he had just smashed 
open, lighted on a supply of tobacco to his great satis- 


280 


MAID OF THE MIST 


faction, and then sat down where he was, to wait till the 
fog cleared. But this, he perceived, was not one of 
their usual clinging fogs which enveloped one like a pall 
of cotton-wool. It drove on a rising wind and sped 
past him in dense whirling coils that made his head spin. 
He thought briefly of mighty spirits of the air trailing 
ghostly garments in rapid flight. Down below him, in 
the black rifts and along the sides of the pile, the water 
was yapping savagely, as if the wild beast would wait 
no longer. 

When the last of the fog tore past him in tattered 
fragments, he found to his dismay that the sea between 
him and home was beyond any man’s swimming, — every 
channel raging and foaming, and the banks between 
boiling furiously in the rising tide and the rush of the 
south-west wind. The raft he had made had already 
broken loose and started northwards on its own ac- 
count. It went to pieces on the nearest bank, as he 
watched, and swept away in fragments. 

There was nothing for it but waiting. So sudden a 
storm might pass as quickly as it had come. 

For himself he had no great fears. The pile had 
stood a thousand storms, and worse ones than this. 
But he was filled with anxiety on Avice’s account. She 
would imagine the worst when he did not come, and her 
suffering would be great. Thought of her troubled 
him infinitely more than fear for himself. 

He tried hard to make her out on the beach, though 
how to reassure her he did not know. But the sky was 
overcast and the atmosphere murky with sweeping 
showers, and he could not even see the point. 

He was wet through with his swim, and the wind, 
though not cold in itself, was so strong that it chilled 
him. He searched about for shelter, and coming on a 
huge case which presented a solid back to the weather, 
he stove in the front and found it contained fine lace 
curtains. He hauled out a sufficiency, which the wind 


MAID OF THE MIST 


281 


whisked playfully away. Then he crept into their 
place, grateful for so much, and lay and watched the 
strange writhings and contortions of the pile under 
the impact of the gale and the rising tide. 

The wind would go down with the tide probably, and 
then he would make another raft and get home as 
quickly as he could with his flour. For, great as 
Avice’s anxiety would certainly be, they were still short 
of flour, and it would be better to take it with him than 
to have to come back for it. The wreck-pile in a gale 
was a decidedly unpleasant experience, and its beha- 
viour most extraordinary. He had never imagined a 
dead conglomeration such as that capable of such an- 
tics. When the tide was at its height the whole mass 
writhed and shuddered through all its length and 
breadth like some great monster in its death agonies. 
The rifts and chasms gaped and closed like grim black 
wounds or hungry mouths. Strange and awesome 
sounds broke out all about, groanings and creakings, 
ragged rendings and grindings, as the component 
pieces lifted and settled regardless of their neighbours. 
When the tide went down it was more at ease, and the 
only sounds were the waves snapping at the sides and 
gurgling and rushing in the depths below. 

He did not find it very cold. Sheltered from the 
wind, the heat of his body in time made a warm nook 
round him in the heart of the curtains. But he was 
never dry. And before it got too dark, when he saw it 
would be impossible to get away that night, he crept 
out and crawled precariously to and fro till he lighted 
on a small cask of rum. He carried it to his shelter, 
knocking in the head with his axe, and it kept his blood 
warm through the night. But it was a terribly long 
night, chiefly because he was thinking all through it of 
Avice, and her fears for him, and her suffering. 

To his bitter disappointment, morning showed no 


282 


MAID OF THE MIST 


signs of abatement or relief. It brought another wild 
gray day without a glimmer of hope in the sky. 

He had eaten nothing for more than twenty hours 
and was feeling empty and ravenous. The tide had 
risen and gone down again in the night. Before the pile 
began its writhings and contortions again he must eat. 
So he crept out and foraged till he found a barrel of 
pork, and bashed it open and carried back to his nest a 
big chunk which he ate raw and washed down with rum. 

All that day the gale held. He hardly dared to think 
of Avice and yet could think of nothing else. At times, 
under the impulse of his fears for her, he was tempted 
to leap into the sea and try to battle through to the 
point. But when he studied the chances of it, common 
sense prevailed. Adventure into those boiling currents 
meant death as surely as if he cut his throat on the pile. 

If he could only let her know that he was alive. . . . 
If he had had his flint and steel he would have tried to 
set something on fire — even if it were his nest — on the 
chance of her seeing the smoke and understanding it. 
He searched eagerly for another tinder-box, but could 
not light on one. 

It was an anxious and gloomy man that crept into 
the heart of the curtain-case that night ; but he slept, in 
a way and brokenly, in spite of it all, for Nature knows 
man’s limits, and when he goes beyond them she steps 
in at times and takes command. 


LVI 

To Avice, also, that first night was one long horror. 

She made up the fire and sat waiting for him to come. 
He would know in what a state of despair she would be 
and he would certainly come. She was sure he would 
come — if he could. If he did not it was because he 
could not. And ... if he could not. ... 


MAID OF THE MIST 


283 


The wind shrilled eerily outside. It sounded cold 
and heartless . . . pitiless . . . like messages from the 
dead . . . warnings of evil. It got on her nerves and 
set her shivering. She crept to her room at last and 
dropped hopelessly on to her bed, and lay there sorely 
stricken. 

In the gray of the morning she ate mechanically, and 
hurried away to the point for sign or sight of him. But 
it was all she could do to make out the pile itself, like a 
bristling rampart in the dull dim distance. As to dis- 
tinguishing anything on it, that was out of the question. 

She wandered about there all day long, with her eyes 
strained on the pile like one bereft, and only crept back 
when night shut it out and drove her home. 

She was satisfied in her own mind now that he was 
dead. If he had been alive he would certainly have 
come. Well, she would not be long in following him. 
. . . Without him she had no desire to live . . . even 
if she could struggle on alone, which was very doubtful 
. . . better to join him quickly than to drag on miser- 
ably all by herself on that lonely bank, and go crazy in 
the end. 

She sobbed herself asleep, her last wish that she might 
never waken. She had eaten nothing since the morning, 
and then only a hasty scrap that had no taste in it. 
The fire had gone out. ... It did not matter. She 
would go out herself as soon as might be. ... A woful 
end to all their golden hopes and happiness. 

Morning found her still lying spent and hopeless on 
her bed, comatose, neither asleep nor awake, simply 
careless of life and even of the fact that the wind had 
fallen at midnight and that the new day had broken 
soft and clear. 

Then, in her dream-weariness, she heard a voice in the 
outer room — or thought she did — but all her senses 
were dulled except the sense of loss and heartache. 


284 MAID OF THE MIST 

People, she know, heard voices when they were going to 
die. 

“A vice !” — the voice of God calling her — the sweet 
voice of death. She was ready to go. 

“Avice! Where are you.?” — and a tapping on the 
wall of her room. 

How like Wulfrey’s voice! Perhaps he was permit- 
ted to be the messenger, — a gracious thought — a joyful 
thought. 

She rose painfully, stiff with weakness and long ly- 
ing, stumbled to the doorway stood leaning her hands 
against the sides, and peered, white-faced and awe- 
stricken, through the curtains into the room. Then, 
with a broken cry, she threw up her hands and fell for- 
ward into Wulf’s arms. 

When she came to herself she was lying on a blanket 
outside the house and he was bathing her forehead and 
kissing her. She lay looking up at him in wonder, out 
of eyes almost lost in the mists and darkness of her suf- 
fering. She raised a hand and touched his face. 

“Are you real.? Are you alive.?” she whispered 
doubtfully. 

He proved it with hot kisses. His eyes swam with 
pity for her sufferings. Her face and eyes told him all 
the story. 

“By God’s mercy we are both alive, dear. It might 
have been otherwise. ... You have suffered sorely.” 

“I thought you were sent for me . . . the angel of 
Death. And it was so good of them to send you and 
not a stranger. . . . But it is better to have you 
alive,” and happy tears welled weakly out of her eyes 
and rolled down the white cheeks. 

“I believe you have eaten nothing since I went. Lie 
still and I will get you something,” and he jumped up 
and went inside, lighted the fire quickly, and presently 
was sitting by her side, feeding her with warm rum and 


MAID OF THE MIST 


285 


water, for she was icy cold, and some bits of the cakes 
she had made three days before. 

“You ought not to have starved yourself like that,” 
he remonstrated. 

“I was sure you were dead and I had no wish to live. 
. . . You will never go out there again. . . .” 

“Not in the break of a storm anyway. We must go 
to the storehouse sometimes, but we’ll make sure of our 
weather in future.” 

“I wouldn’t have minded if I’d been with you.” 

“I would. It was ghastly out there in the night,” 
and he told her how he had lived in the big case of cur- 
tains, and how the pile heaved and writhed like a 
wounded sea-serpent under the tide and the gale. And 
how he had brought back some flour after all, though it 
had been no easy job as there was no wind to help him. 

“It is dear flour,” she said. “It nearly cost us our 
lives. I would sooner live on raw meat another time.” 


LVII 

That was their sorest trial of the winter. Often, over 
the fire of a night, they talked of it and told one an- 
other all there was to tell of their feelings and their 
fears, and their love burned the brighter for its tem- 
pering. 

But Avice was soon herself again, and as the Spring 
quickened all about and in them, the bitterness of the 
experience gradually faded out of their recollection and 
only the brightness was left. 

And then there was so much to interest one every- 
where that the days were hardly long enough for all 
there was to see and do. 

First, seals — mothers and babies galore. Those 
sandy beaches of the northern coast seemed a favourite 
basking place and nursery, and Avice could creep along 


286 


MAID OF THE MIST 


behind the sandhills, and crawl up among the wire- 
grass, and peep over, and she never tired of watching 
them. There was something so human in the way the 
babies snuggled up to their mothers when they were 
hungry, and still more in the way the mothers looked 
down at their nurslings. 

And the baby-rabbits. They were almost as en- 
trancing as the seMs, but far shyer and more difficult to 
spy upon. 

For the simple lifting of a head among the sparse 
tufts of grass set the hollow below alive with tiny bob- 
bing white scuts, whose terrified owners tumbled over 
one another in their anxiety to get below ground. 
Avice would not hear of rabbit-meat in those days. She 
said the very thought of it made her feel like a cannibal. 

And lastly, — birds. They were coming back in 
flights. The eastern point seemed their chosen ground, 
but closer at hand stray families were found, and im- 
portunate babies were being fed by the cold-eyed moth- 
ers with whom, a few months later, they would be wag- 
ing the fierce battle for food. But Avice never took to 
the birds as she did to the seals and rabbits. She could 
never forget what they would grow into — brigands and 
fighters and cold-blooded raucous screamers at all times. 

Now and again they lived on the ‘Jane and Mary’ for 
a week by way of a change, and fish was always obtain- 
able whether they were afloat or ashore. 

The clear fire of their love waxed ever stronger, de- 
voured the days and weeks and months, and refined and 
fused them all into golden memories without one small- 
est speck of alloy. More devoted lover never woman, 
had, nor man a sweeter mistress. Never was princess of 
the blood — without a bar across her scutcheon — held in 
loftier esteem or shown it more gallantly. Never, in 
word or act, did he offend her sense of right in the 
smallest degree ^ yet she could set his heart leaping and 
his blood racing by a touch — and she knew it. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


287 


Sometime, — when he believed it right — she knew he 
would ask more of her. It was inevitable. She had 
known it from the beginning. And she had not fear of 
it. Love such as theirs knows nothing of fear. 

They were not playing at love. They loved with all 
the white fire of passionate devotion which loses sight of 
self in the one beloved. For better, for worse; in life, 
in death, she was wholly his. With the ardour of the 
Spring in her blood, and the love-light in her eyes, she 
waited for him to speak. 


LVIII 

Time came when, according to her calendar, he had 
been there full twelve months and she just about nine. 
And as to prospect of escape, or further addition to 
their company, they were in exactly the same position 
as when they came. 

Whenever they discussed that matter, she said, “Still, 
I came ashore alive.” 

And he always said, “You were the miracle. Besides 
you were nine-tenths dead.” 

She wondered when he would ask the next step of her, 
and how he would do it. Her answer was ready — her- 
self. Still, something of extra fragrance — something 
ineffably sweet and delicate — would cling to it for ever, 
or be for ever just that much lacking, according to the 
manner of his asking. 

But she believed his great love would choose the 
proper chord and strike it with strong and gentle fin- 
gers. 

And it did. 

They were sitting in the firelight one night, when a 
more than usually pregnant silence fell on them. The 
depth of their feeling for one another expressed itself 
not infrequently in these long dehcious pauses in their 


288 


MAID OF THE MIST 


talk, when that which was in them was all too sacred for 
words. Her Northern blood, of which she was proud, 
prevailed as a rule over the Gallic strain, which she held 
in light esteem, and made for undemonstrativeness in 
any outward display of feeling. But she felt to the 
depths, and when she did permit the brakes to slip, the 
wheels struck sparks. 

He also was more doer than talker. Hence those 
long sweet silences, when she lay with her head in his 
arm in the coloured firelight, and the gentle play of his 
hand on her hair was more to them both than all the 
words in the world. 

But this night there was more in the silences that fell 
on them. In both their hearts the high-charged 
thought and feelings of many months were converging 
to a point. The quickening of the Spring was in their 
blood. 

His hand slipped suddenly down from her hair and 
clasped on both of hers where they lay in her lap. His 
voice as he spoke was deep with emotion. It thrilled 
her to the depths. She felt the hot pulses in his hand 
leaping and throbbing. His words were very simple, as 
became a matter so vital. Deepest feeling needs no 
garnishment. 

“Dearest, you have honoured me with your trust and 
love” Her hands turned and clasped his fervently. 

“Every hair of your head is precious to me. I would 
not knowingly offend your feelings in any smallest 
thing. . . . We are here, cut off from our kind, it may 
be, forever. ... We are as alone here with God, as 
Adam and Eve were in The Garden. ... You make 
my Paradise. You can perfect it. . . . Will you.^ . . .” 

And for answer she put up her arms, and drew down 
his face, and kissed him passionately, and clung to him 
as if she would never let him go. 

“I thank God for so precious a gift,” he said, clasp- 
ing her to him so that she felt his heart pounding inside 


MAID OF THE MIST 


289 


as furiously as her own. 

“Heart . . . soul . . . body ... all yours!” she 
whispered, and he kissed her hair, because her face was 
hidden, and clasped her closer still. 

“It is the ordained crown of our love,” he said pres- 
ently, when their first blinding whirl of emotion was 
over. “I cannot see that we offend any law of man’s, 
for here we are beyond the law. God’s law we are 
surely keeping. . . . And, so as not to act on simple 
impulse I have thought that we would let another 
month go by before . . .” and he kissed her rosy face 
again. 

“But why.?” 

“Perhaps you have not thought it all out as I 
have ” 

“But I have ... I knew it must be so. . . .” and 
the joy in him was very great. 

“All the same, dear, we will not enter into that high 
estate without your very fullest consideration. . . . 
And if you should find any reason or instinct against it 
I shall abide by your decision.” 

“I am all yours. I shall not change.” 

“From what the mate said I imagine this island may 
pertain to Nova Scotia. It is possible that Scottish 
law runs there. . . . We can take one another for man 
and wife and place it on record. . . .” 

“How.?” 

“We have books with fly-leaves. Among the sand- 
hills you will find all the quills you want. The birds 
are some use after all. . . . Anyone can make a pen 
. . . and ink we can always get even though it is red. 
. . . All we need for a good Scots marriage is a pair of 
witnesses.” 

“Seals, rabbits, birds. . . .” 

“They cannot testify. . . . All we can do,” he said 
thoughtfully, “if, by God’s mercy, we ever leave this 
place is to regularise ourselves by proper marriage 


290 


MAID OF THE MIST 


ashore as soon as we land. But the prospects of get- 
ting away seem very small, I’m afraid.” 

“We have been very happy here. We can still be 
very happy here,” she said contentedly. 

So amazing is this great power of Love in coyering 
all deficiencies of outward circumstance. 

LIX 

The days shpped past, and each day he watched her 
quietly for slightest sign of compunction or retraction. 
And if such had come to her, sore though he might have 
felt, and bereaved of the perfect unfolding of the fair 
flower of their love, he would have choked the feeling 
down, trampled on it, buried it so that she would have 
seen no sign of it in him. For he recognized to the full- 
est what a mighty thing this was that he was asking of 
her. 

But she understood him perfectly, fathomed his 
fears, was on the look-out for his quietly-questioning 
looks, and met them with clear full-eyed serenity and a 
face rosy at times with anticipation. 

“You need not fear for me,” she laughed softly, one 
night as she lay in his arms before the fire. “I shall not 
change.” 

He clasped her closer. “I could not blame you if you 
did. From every worldly point of view you would be 
right ” 

“What have we to do with worldly points of view.? 
We are out of it all. We are here alone, and like to be. 
And we are doing right in our own eyes.” 

“I would risk my soul on what seems right to these 
pure eyes,” and he bent and kissed them warmly. 

“Ten more days !” she murmured, and nestled closer, 
with her head on his breast so that she could feel the 
strong beating of his heart. 


MAID OF THE MIST 291 

“It says ‘Avice ! — Avice ! — A vice !’ ” he said quietly. 
“It is full of Avice,” and she pressed still closer. 

So the great day came, the greatest day either of 
their lives had known. 

Wulf had found sleep impossible. His heart, full- 
charged, felt like to burst its mortal bounds. He rose 
quietly in the dark and went out into the soft twilight 
of the dawn — to greet the coming of the perfect day. 
And she, as impossible of sleep as he, heard him in spite 
of all his caution, and laughed softly to herself for very 
happiness in him and in herself. And when he had gone, 
she thanked God for this great gift of a true man’s love, 
and for that in herself which responded to it so fully. 

She had not a doubt nor a fear. The smallest of 
either would have barred her from him. But there was 
not the smallest shadow between them. Their hearts 
were one. It was meet and good that their lives should 
be one also. 

Wulfrey paced the beach out there and found the 
silent darkness soothing to his bounding senses. 

It was late April. The air was sweet and fresh. The 
sea just breathed in its sleep and no more. The water 
rippled silently up the hard sand with scarce a murmur. 
The darkness of the eastern sky thinned as he paced 
and watched. There came a soft effusion of light there. 
It throbbed and grew. A faint touch of carmine out- 
lined a cloud above it. The darkness seemed to fade 
and melt out of the sky. All the tiny clouds above him 
turned their faces to the east and flushed rose-red with 
the joy of the new day. 

He climbed a hill and caught the flrst golden gleam 
of the rising sun. His eyes shone, and his face. In his 
eyes two suns were reflected. But there was only one 
sun. And they were two and now were to become one. 
The Perfect Day had dawned. 

And just as she, lying in her bed with her face in her 


292 


i MAID OF THE MIST 


hands, had thanked God for His goodness, so he. He 
flung his right hand up towards the sun in the brighten- 
ing sky and said deeply, ‘‘My God, I thank Thee for 
this day and most of all for her !” 

And, down belaw, he saw her coming out of the house 
towards him. 

He sprang down to meet her, caught her hands, and 
looked right down through her eyes into her heart, and 
was satisfied. 


LX 

Arm in arm they paced the beach till the sun was well 
up, and their bank of sand shone in the flood of golden 
light as it had never shone before, — fresh and sweet as 
if but new-created. 

A light wind had come with the sun. The small waves 
came hurrying in as though they were invited guests. 
At sight of the wedding-party they broke into crisp 
white laughter, curled themselves over in league-long 
sickles of tenderest lucent green, and raced up the sands 
to their feet in long soft swirls of liquid amber, laced 
with bubbles and edged with creamy foam. 

“They haste to the wedding, to pay their tribute to 
the only bride they have ever set eyes on,” said Wulf, 
as they stopped to watch them. “And each one is glad 
to give his life for a single peep at her.” 

“Foolish little waves,” laughed she. “I am going to 
make their very close acquaintance presently. How 
beautiful the sea is this morning!” — as her eyes trav- 
elled out to the wide blue sweep beyond, with its dapple 
of purple shadows. 

“The most beautiful sea and the most wonderful 
morning that ever was,” he asserted heartily. “But it 
is only a beginning. There will be many more like it. 
And still better.” 


MAID OF THE MIST 293 

“I am so glad it is so sweet a day. A dull one would 
have troubled me.” 

‘‘But it could not possibly have been anything else.” 

“Oh, but it could.” 

“In mere outward accident perhaps. But I’ve got 
the sun inside me. I wonder it doesn’t show through.” 

“It does,” she laughed joyously. “You are all 
aglow.” 

“And never man had better reason. I would not 
change places with all the kings of all the earth rolled 
into one.” 

“Nor I with all the queens. We are happier here by 
far with nothing but ourselves.” 

“Ourselves, and our Love, and infinite Hope. Now 
let us go and eat. My bride must not starve. That 
would be a bad beginning. Did you sleep 

“Not a wink. I heard you go out.” 

“And I was pluming myself on not having made a 
sound.” 

While she was making cakes he busied himself making 
a pen out of a quill he had picked up on the beach, and 
she smiled when she saw what he was at. 

‘And the ink.?” she asked. 

“I’ve got it all ready. I always carry some with me 
in case of need,” at which she knitted her brows prettily 
and looked puzzled. 

After breakfast she said, “Now you must leave me 
for a couple of hours. I am going to thank the waves 
for their good wishes and then I shall go to the fresh- 
water pool.” 

“You will be very careful. You won’t get yourself 
drowned.” 

“I will be very careful. And you !” 

‘I will ffo across to the spit. But when we are 
wed” 

“Yes — then !” she nodded rosily, and he kissed her 
and went off past the fresh-water pools, and splashed 


MAID OF THE MIST 


through the narrows that joined their lake to the 
smaller one, and so to the shore and into the sea, .for 
the last time alone. 

He waited till he was sure she had done with their 
bathing-pool, and then ran across and plunged into it, 
for the salt water braces, but sticks and never makes 
one feel so clean as fresh. 

She was still busy with the princely brush and comb 
when he came on her, and his heart leaped again at her 
fresh and radiant beauty. 

She had clothed herself all in spotless linen, swathed 
about her in that marvellous fashion of which she held 
the secret to perfection. To his repoicing eyes she 
appeared half angel, half Vestal Virgin, yet all be- 
witching human girl, and, best of all, his bride. 

“Be thankful you’re a man, and delivered from this,” 
she said, her eyes shining through the glorious veil at 
his visible joy in her. 

“I’m thankful I’m a man, but I wouldn’t have you 
relieved of that for half the world. I glory in it,” and 
he bent and kissed it. “For a moment I thought you 
were an angel.” 

“Perhaps I am.” 

“I know you are. But, thank God, you’re human 
too ! Men don’t wed with angels. ... I must go and 
dress myself also,” and he disappeared into the house. 
When, in due course, he came out, gallantly clad in a 
long blue coat with flap-pockets, and figured vest, and 
white silk knee-breechers, and stockings to suit, she 
first stared and then laughed. 

“My faith, but we are fine !” said she. “But, in truth, 
I like you best as I have known you best. Do you 
marry in a dead man’s clothes.?” 

“Not if I know it. Sooner in my rags. But, to the 
best of my belief, these belonged to your friend the 
Duke of Kent. Macro would have them, but little he 
dreamed of the high use to which they would be put. I 


MAID OF THE MIST 295 

borrow them for the occasion. His Highness would 
make no objection I am sure.” 

“I am sure he would not, and they become you well. 
But still I like you best as I have known you best.” 

‘T will doff them presently. But you are so like a 
queen that I did not like to come to you like a beggar.” 

In his hand he had brought the Prayer-book, with the 
quill in a certain place. 

He stepped up to her and lifted her hand to his lips. 

“You do not repent you of this we are about to do.^” 

“I shall never repent it,” she said, with dancing eyes. 

“Please God, and as far as in me lies, you shall never 
have cause to repent it. . . . We are here, our two 
selves, with none to witness this that we do but God. . . . 
We are doing what we believe to be right for our own 
great happiness and well-being. ... It would suffice, I 
believe, for a Scots wedding, simply to declare ourselves 
man and wife. But I have thougjit it would please us 
both to do something more. We are not entering upon 
this new estate lightly or without due thought. ... It 
will, I know, be to both our minds and comforting to 
both our hearts, to think that in our loneliness here we 
have done all we could to supply the deficiencies for 
which we are not to blame.” 

He spoke with very great emotion. She rejoiced in 
this fresh evidence of the heights and depths of his na- 
ture and his essential goodness of heart, though indeed 
she had not needed it. 

Her great dark eyes, fixed on his, were abrim with 
happy tears. 

“So,” he continued, “We will read together the Form 
for the Solemnization of Matrimony in this Prayer- 
book, and then we will inscribe on the front leaf of it the 
fact that this day we have become man and wife. We 
will sign our names to it, and we can do no more to 
comply with man’s law. ... Is that your will, my 
dear.?” 


296 


MAID OF THE MIST 


“Yes.” 

“Then here we will kneel and wed,” and down they 
knelt in the sand, with a clear sky and bright sun above, 
and the blue sea that held them captive dancing and 
laughing in front; and holding the book between them 
he read the Service aloud in a deep and reverent voice. 

Parts of it were of course somewhat incongruous to 
their situation, but he would not slur or miss a word. 
The statement that they were gathered together in the 
face of this congregation almost provoked her to an ex- 
plosion. For out of the corner of her eye, as she fol- 
lowed his reading, a slight movement on the side of an 
adjacent sandhill showed her a rabbit, sitting up and 
watching them with critical attention, and it looked to 
her just like the frowsy old female in black she had seen 
hovering about the skirts of a wedding in a London 
church. 

And there were parts that brought the colour to her 
face, though she was familiar with them. Applied to 
oneself they seemed to hold new point and meaning. 

However, he read bravely on. No one interfered to 
show any just cause why they should not lawfully be 
joined together, nor had either of them any confession 
of impediment to make. 

At the “Wilt thou he answered heartily, “I 

will.” And waited for her to do the same when her 
turn came. 

When it came to — “Who giveth this woman to be 
married to this man.?’” — he answered boldly, — “God.” 

Then they took hands and plighted their troth, re- 
citing the words in the book. 

But when it came to the putting on of the ring there 
came an interlude not provided for in the Marriage 
Service. 

He had duly provided a plain gold wedding ring. 

“Where did you get it.?” she asked with a look of 
surprise. 


MAID OF THE MIST 


297 


‘‘I found it among Macro’s treasures.” 

‘Tt must be some dead woman’s, then. I would 
sooner not. Can we not leave that out.^^ Will it make 
any difference 

“No, dear. It will make no difference to our being 
truly wed.” 

“Then please go on without it.” 

So they left the ring out and read on to the end to- 
gether. 

He closed the book and drew her to him as they knelt, 
and kissed her as his wife. 

“Now,” he said, lifting her up. “We will put on 
record the most wonderful thing that has ever hap- 
pened on this island, and when we will go home and pre- 
pare the marriage-feast. ... I wonder now if James 
Elwes, M.A., late of Brasenose College, Oxford, is aware 
of the high use to which his Prayer-book is being put,” 
— as he pointed to the name inscribed on the fly-leaf, 
and turned over to the blank on the other side. 

“Do you think they know.?” 

“I do not see why not. But as we never knew him, 
nor he us, it is possible he is not present.” 

And suddenly those words at the beginning of the 
Marriage Service assumed a new and mighty signifi- 
cance for her. “In the face of this congregation” 
might mean more than she had ever dreamed of. Per- 
haps her mother had been there If she had, if she 

should be here now — it was somewhat startling to think 
of — she would be glad, for she would know how good 
and true a man this was. 

But he was busily writing, and at the sight she cried, 
“Oh !” — for the writing was red and the ink was drawn 
from a little jag he had made in his arm. 

“In blood,” she said, with a touch of dismay. 

“It could not be put to better use,” he laughed. “It 
is all at your service ... to the very last drop. . . . 


298 


MAID OF THE MIST 


How begin better than by setting down here that we 
are one till death?” 

“What you said made me think that perhaps my 
mother had been with us ” 

“I am sure she was, and mine too. . . . They will 
both approve, you may be sure. . . . Here is what I 
have written — 

‘I, Wulfrey Dale, do hereby declare that I have this 
day taken Avice Drummond to be my lawful wedded 
wife.’ And for you, ‘I, Avice Drummond, do hereby 
declare that I have this day taken Wulfrey Dale to be 
my lawful wedded husband.’ Now I will sign. . . . And 
you will sign there . . . and I will add the date as far 
as we know it . . . and our present place of abode — 
Sable Island.” 

He held the book till the writing was dry, then kissed 
her signature. “It is the first time I have set eyes on 
your handwriting,” he said. “It is like yourself — clear 
and strong and true . . . Mistress Dale,” — with a 
smiling bow, as he handed her the book, — “your mar- 
riage-lines! You will like to keep them.” 

“And the pen, please,” she said, holding out her hand 
for it, and wrapping it and the book in a fold of her 
white robe. “These will be more to mee than all the 
treasures of the world.” 

He put his arm round her and they went slowly home 
— man and wife. 


BOOK V 


GARDEN OF EDEN 


LXI 

Happy? If all newly-married folk could find such hap- 
piness as was theirs, what a wonderful world it would 
be ! 

From every worldly point of view they had nothing. 
They were outcasts, paupers, dependent for the food 
they ate and the clothes they wore, on Nature and the 
caprice of the sea. Yet, having nothing, they had 
everything, since they had one another. 

If he had rejoiced in her before, and loved her with a 
love akin to pain in the repression he subjected it to, he 
loved her now a thousand times more, and she filled him 
with a joy that knew no bounds. Time, he said to him- 
self, would not suffice for all their love, it would fill 
eternity. 

The days were never long enough for them. In this 
new joy of life and perfected fellowship they forgot 
their years at times, and were like a pair of childrn, en- 
dowed with the freedom of time and space and hearts 
attuned to the most perfect enjoyment of these new 
attributes. 

They made long journeys and explored every inch of 
their territory — sleeping out at times in the side of a 
sandhill under the soft summer night. And those were 
wondrous times. 

— To lie there flat on their blanket, side by side, chin 
in hand like children, his arm about her, and watch the 
red sun sink into the water at the end of his fiery trail, 
while all the sky above burned crimson right into the 

m 


soo 


MAID OF THE MIST 


east behind them. — To watch, with bated breath, the 
rabbits creeping out to feed and frolic about them, all 
unconscious of their presence. — To lie and watch the 
colours fade slowly in the darkening sky, and the stars 
come out till the whole dark dome was a never-failing 
marvel of delight. — Or, on the other shore, to lie and 
watch the moonbeams dancing on the sleeping bosom 
of the sea. — To feel oneself oneself in the midst of it all 
— a part of it all — the height and the width and the 
immensity and wonder of it all. — To feel his arm enfold- 
ing her, and all that that meant to them both. — To feel 
the warmth of life, and all the mighty joy of it, throb- 
bing in her slender body as he drew her closer. — To 
know, as he knew, that God lived and had given her to 
him, and that she loved him with every fibre of her 
being, as he loved her. . . . 

Happy.? At times, so full was her heart that she 
wondered if such happiness was right for mortals to 
enjoy, and so, if it could last. 

And when she shared that with him, as they shared 
everything in common, he reasoned her back to comfort. 

•“Happiness and health are life’s proper conditions,” 
he asserted, with such hearty conviction that her doubts 
hid their heads. “Sorrow and sickness come of tres- 
pass, somehow, somewhere, somewhen, though it is not 
always easy to trace them back to first causes. But, 
without doubt, people were meant to be as healthy and 
happy as it is possible for them to be.” 

“But I have known people suffer who, I am sure, 
never did any wrong — none, that is, deserving of suf- 
fering such as they had. In fact,” she mused, “it seems 
to me that the good people suffer most and the wicked 
prosper.” 

“That is as we judge. But we see only the outsides 
of things and we are purblind at best. Nature has cer- 
tain laws, and God has certain laws — though a parson 
could tell you more about these than I can. And if 


MAID OF THE MIST 


301 


those laws are broken the results have to be borne, and 
sometimes they run on and on and fall on innocent peo- 
ple.” 

“It doesn’t seem very fair.” 

“The laws cannot be altered for individuals or ex- 
ceptional cases. Fathers sin and the children suffer. 
But the blame is the fathers’.” 

“Yes,” she nodded, and perhaps she was thinking of 
her own case. 

“So you’ve no need to fear being as happy as you 
can,” he added quickly. “God meant you for happi- 
ness, and truly, I think we have more certainty of it 
here than we might have had elsewhere.” 

“I am sure of it and I am happy,” and she nestled 
still closer under his folding arm. 

But they had their strenuous working times as well, 
and enjoyed them equally. He developed his new-found 
capacity for carpentering. ^ Made her more chairs and 
a table, added to the comfort of their house in many 
ways. And she kept it all in perfect order, and 
attended to the cooking, and proved herself a most ad- 
mirable housewife and helpmate. 

They were down almost to fundamentals. Their life 
— partaking as it did of the development of the ages, 
and so of the wider freedom of thought and feeling, 
was the life of the ancients and not far from idyllic. 

The hunter went forth to the chase — though it was 
only rabbits — and the fisherman to the lake, and 
brought home his spoils to his waiting mate, and they 
ate of them and were content. 

They enjoyed the most perfect health, and for so- 
ciety they had one another and desired no more — at all 
events, no outsiders. 

They had storms and mists and spells of dull weather, 
but their house was proof against all assault from with- 
out, and warm and bright with their abounding love. 
They had fire and light and books and themselves, and 


302 


MAID OF THE MIST 


always in time the sun shone out again, and they en- 
joyed it the more perhaps for its frequent defaults. 

They had their trying times too. Stores had to be 
replenished from the pile, and, after that dreadful ex- 
perience before they were married, she would not be 
left behind. 

“I do not care what happens if we are together,” 
she said. “The worst that could happen would be noth- 
ing compared with that other time,” and he could not 
gainsay her. 

So whenever he had to go she went also, and they 
chose their day with care and made a picnic of it, and 
came home laden with spoils. 

Only once they got caught by one of those swift- 
travelling mists which seemed to spring from nowhere. 
It swept over them just as they were preparing to 
leave, and in the twinkling of an eye they were prison- 
ers, bound clammily to the pile till it should pass. For 
in that close-clinging bank, as thick as wet cotton-wool, 
all sense of direction was gone in a moment. They 
could not see a foot before them, the pile was pitted 
with death-traps, a step might be fatal. 

They had both come lightly clad, for the day had 
been warm and the wreckage claimed unhampered limbs. 

Fortunately they had come upon a case of blankets 
during their operations. 

“Sit you down here,” he said, as he felt her shivering 
under his arm, “And I’ll get you some blankets.” 

“You won’t get yourself lost.^”’ she asked anxiously. 

“Not if you will keep calling to me,” and he crawled 
away in search of the case, while she sat calling, “Wulf 
. . . Wulf . . . Wulf,” and he answered her, “A vice 
. . . Avice . . . Avice,” and at last a shout, “I’ve 
got it.” 

And presently his muffled “Avice . . . Avice . . . 
Avice,” drew near again, and he loomed through the 
fog like a creeping ghost, and taking her arm they crept 


MAID OF THE MIST 


303 


together from blanket to blanket, which he had spread 
as a guide, till they came to the case itself. He hauled 
out more of its contents till there was room inside for 
both of them, and they crawled into their nest and in 
time got warm and comfortable. 

The fog showed no sign of lifhting, so before it got 
quite dark he crawled out again, she calling to him as 
before, and found a cask of rum, of which there was 
always plenty about, and one of pork, and on these they 
supped as best they could. 

The writhing and creaking of the pile, as the tide 
rose and fell, caused her some alarm. But he explained 
it all to her, and after a time she fell asleep with his 
arm about her, and they were wakened to a clear bright 
morning by the shrieking and squabbling of the birds 
over the barrel of pork, which he had left standing 
open. 

The barrel itself and all the pile adjacent seemed 
suddenly to have sprouted feathers. It was alive with 
fiercely-beating wings and jerking feathered necks and 
squirming feathered bodies, and cold hard little glassy 
eyes, and cruel rending beaks, and shrill angry cries. 

‘‘How hideous they are !” she said, shrinking back 
into the case. 

“It is the great fight for life. They seem always 
hungry.” 

The barrel stood on end. The fortunate ones among 
the feathered pirates wormed themselves in, and tore 
and rent at the food, regardless of the shrill expostula- 
tions of their fellows and the beaks and claws that tore 
and rent at them in turn, till the barrel itself was lost 
under a seething mass of shrieking, fiercely-struggling 
birds. They pecked at one another’s glassy eyes, they 
struck wildly with their wings, they clawed with some- 
what futile feet, and all the time screamed at the tops 
of their voices as though they were trying who could 
scream the loudest. 


304 ; 


MAID OF THE MIST 


‘I wish they’d empty it and go,” said she, and he 
wrenched down a slat of wood and leaned out with a 
blanket over his head and arm, and succeeded at last in 
tipping the barrel over, and pork and pirates rolled out 
together. 

It was all cleaned up in five minutes and the cloud 
drifted away after other prey. The disappointed ones 
swooped round the empty barrel for a time, and some of 
the bolder, or more hungry, or least intelligent, came 
fluttering at the opening in the blanket-box as though 
set on fresh meat at any cost, and he had to beat them 
back with his slat. It was only when a score or more 
were flopping brokenly about the pile in front of the 
box that the rest grew tired of so losing a game and 
sped away to join the main body. As soon as the way 
was clear, he helped her out of her nest and they got 
to their raft, and eventually safely home. 

But that was only an incident, though it confirmed 
her dislike and dread of the pile. She still always in- 
sisted on going with him when he had to go, and at such 
times they laboured long and hard, and got in supplies 
enough for many weeks, and so went out there as sel- 
dom as possible. 


LXII 

So, working, wandering, bathing, reading, hunting, 
fishing, eating, sleeping, with hearts and minds stripped 
bare to one another and every thought in common, they 
lived that first golden year of their married life, and 
grew into still closer fellowship and communion, into 
still clearer understanding of one another, into still 
greater love, — although, at the beginning, all this would 
have seemed to them impossible. But there are always 
heights and depths beyond, and will be, until the final 
heights are scaled — and doubtless even then also. 

And now, to one such depth and height they were 


MAID OF THE MIST 


305 


drawing near, with a touch of not unnatural fear on 
her part, as to an experience unknown and invested with 
all the possibilities of life and death, and new life. 

He cheered her with his own great confidence; and 
her reliance on his professional knowledge, and the love 
he bore her, comforted her mightily. But they both 
knew full well that, given all the knowledge and love in 
the world, the certain issue of this great matter still 
lay beyond the utmost power of man ; and it sent them 
to their knees and brought them nigher heaven than 
ever in their lives before. 

It also set her very busily to work on tiny garments, 
which she had to contrive as best she could from her 
very scant materials. And it set him to the making of 
a cradle out of a very carefully-cleaned and sand- 
scrubbed pork-barrel, which turned out an immense 
sucess and filled him with great pride of accomplish- 
ment. 

She was in the very best of health, without a trouble 
on her mind, and rejoicing more than ever in his joy 
and pride in her. And these and the free open-air life 
they led all made for good. He would not permit her a 
despondent thought, though as the time drew near she 
not seldom, for his sake, assumed a braver and more 
cheerful aspect than her heart actually warranted. 

But all went well, and within a day or two of the 
anniversary of their wedding-day, their son, Wulfrey, 
was born and proved himself at once a true Islander, 
lusty both of lung and limb. 

Prouder and happier father and mother, and more 
wonderful baby, it is safe to say that island never saw. 
And if their days had been full of delight before, the 
coming of Little Wulf filled them quite three times as 
full. For there was Little Wulf’s own happiness, which 
was patent to all, — and his mother’s rapture in him, 
and his father’s, — and his father’s mighty joy in them 
both, — and her joy in his joy, — and so on all round 


306 


MAID OF THE MIST 


the compass; — and deep below and high above and all 
through it all, their unbounded thankfulness for safe 
deliverance from peril. 

If he had admired and loved her as a maid, and 
loved and rejoiced in her as a wife, — as mother of his 
child he found himself at times dumb with excess of de- 
light. He could only sit and watch, with worshipful 
eyes, and newer and deeper thoughts of that other 
Mother, and of The Child whose coming had trans- 
formed the world. 

She got out the treasured old Prayer-book, and they 
read over him as much as seemed applicable to his case 
of the Ministration of Private Baptism of Infants, and 
then inscribed on the fly-leaf, under the record of their 
marriage, his name, Wulfrey Drummond Dale, and the 
date of his birth as nearly as they knew it — with the 
same pen as before, in the same red ink, and from the 
same glad source. 

And now indeed their days were full, and their nights, 
for Master Wulfrey had an appetite that brooked no 
waiting, and he ruled that household with a lusty pair 
of lungs against which even equinoctial gales strove in 
vain. 

But it was all part of the price of their joy in him, 
and they paid it joyfully; and here paid them tenfold 
by simply being alive and permitting them to watch 
his vigorous kickings as he lay naked on a blanket at 
their feet in the sunshine. 

Avice was speedily herself again, herself and so very 
much more. In his rejoicing eyes all her beauty was 
clarified, dignified, emphasised manifold, in a way that 
he would not have believed possible. 

It was his turn now, in spite of all his philosophy, — 
and at times hers again also — to marvel at all that had 
been vouchsafed them, and to wonder, with a fleeting 
touch of fear, if happiness so great could possibly last. 
The sense of the mighty responsibility their lovQ 


MAID OF THE MIST 


307 


entailed was upon them. Suppose, by any dire mis- 
fortune, he were to be taken away, — what would hap- 
pen to them.P He believed her capable of rising to the 
occasion for the boy’s sake and doing man’s work in his 
place, but it would be a desperately hard fight for her. 
Suppose they should be taken from him — either, both. 
God! — he could spare the boy best, but it would be 
terrible to lose either. 

And suppose, thought she in turn, either of them- 
selves should be taken! Suppose they should both be 
^ken! — Well, in that case the poor little fellow would 
linger behind but a very short time. They would soon 
all be together again. 

But such black thoughts, natural as they were, in- 
evitable almost, still partook, to both their minds, of 
basest ingratitude and lack of trust. And yet they 
did high service, for, when they came upon them their 
souls went down on their knees, and there they found 
strength and joyousness again. 

Little Wulf — but they very early began to call him 
Cubbie, it seemed so appropriate — fulfilled all the 
promise of his advent. He was a marvellous child. He 
crawled vigorously at nine months, and headed straight 
across the soft yellow sand for the water, like a true 
Islander, born of freedom and the open air and the 
sunshine, the moment he discovered this new power. 
And they followed him, foot by foot, with beaming 
faces, as he wallowed along like a well-developed white 
frog, digging his little snub nose into the sand at times, 
but gurgling and laughing all the same, and struggling 
on without a look to right or left, intent only on the 
water in front. 

At the lip of the tide, where it came creaming up the 
beach in long soft swirls of amber, laced with bubbles 
and edged with filmy foam, she was for snatching him 
up. But Wulf stayed her. He wanted to see what the 
boy would do. 


308 


I MAID OF THE MIST 


He was no stranger to cold water, but he had so far 
met it only in a tuh, never in such quantity as this. He 
crawled on along the wet sand and the soft swirl came 
rushing up to welcome him. It was quite two inches 
deep. It filled him with astonishment and took away his 
breath. Everything under him seemed on the move. 
He stiffened for a second on his front paws, gave a huge 
bellow of amazement, tried to grab the back-streaming 
water with both hands as a cat pounces on a mouse, 
and then set off after it at top speed, and was swung 
up into the air by his delighted father, and held there, 
kicking and crowing, and striving still after the en- 
chanted water below. 

“He’ll do,” laughed Wulf. “He’ll swim as soon as 
he can walk. The first native ! And a credit to the 
Island!” 

Golden days ! If the first year of their married life 
was all pure gold, this second was gold overlaid with 
jewels of rare delight. Every moment of it was happi- 
ness unalloyed. The boy throve mightily. Avice was 
in the best of health and spirits, and to the eyes of her 
lover grew more beautiful with every day that passed. 

What more could the soul of man desire? 


LXIII 

Their Wulf Cub was fifteen months old, and could swim 
like a fish, and run like a free-born savage, and talk in a 
jargon of his own which was yet quite understandable 
to his parents, when his sister Avice came on the scene. 
She took after her mother, and her father vowed there 
never had been such a lovely child born into this world 
before. 

Their patriarchal life flowed on, deepening and wid- 
ening, as it went, and so far without any break in its 
smooth-swelling current. The great gales, to which 


MAID OF THE MIST 


S09 


they had grown accustomed, piled up ever-increasing 
supplies for them. Within certain narrow bounds they 
knew no lack, nor would they though they lived there 
for a hundred years. On great occasions the wreckage 
even yielded them luxuries of the commonplace which in 
the former life they had looked upon as ordinary ad- 
juncts to a meal and accepted perfunctorily, without a 
thought of special thankfulness. But here they were 
rarities, priceless delicacies to be held in esteem and 
made the most of. Apples for example. Once their 
western point was strewn thick with what seemed a 
whole ship-load of delicious red apples. They had 
probably been packed in frail barrels or cases which the 
waves made short work of, and the birds were for- 
tunately away. They spent days carrying them up 
above tide-level and then transporting them home, and 
revelled in apples for weeks till their stock went bad. 
Another time it was potatoes, which they had not 
tasted for over three years. Wulf declared it was 
almost worth while to have been denied them so long, 
to find such new relish in them now. Avice regretted, 
for the children’s sakes, that they could not have them 
all the time. 

And that set him to planting a quantity in some of 
the damp bottoms by the water-pools. They came up 
all right, but the rabbits cleared the green shoots as 
fast as they appeared. Upon that he fenced off a 
patch with some of his superflous raft timber and 
planted more, and succeeded in raising a small crop, 
but they were a degenerate race, lacking the good soil 
which had gone to the making of their ancestors. 

Curiously enough, that fact started into expression 
trains of thought that had been latent in both their 
minds. 

He had come in exultantly with his first fruits of the 
potato-patch, Cuhbie at his heels proudly bearing one 


310 


MAID OF THE MIST 


in each hand, and Avice cooked them rejoicingly and 
pronounced them excellent. 

“It will be so delightful to have potatoes again,” 
said she. 

But he was critical of his own production, as the 
author of a work — even though it be but a potato — 
may be allowed to be. “They have neither the texture 
nor the flavour of the original stock,” he said. “I sup- 
pose they need better soil than our old sandbank can 
afford them,” — and his eyes happened to fall on 
Cubbie munching away at a potato, and hers lighted on 
the dark little head in her arm. The same thought 
pricked both their hearts and their eyes met with 
understanding. 

As with potatoes — so with children. He and she, 
growths of the larger world, had found unlooked-for 
happiness through the accident of their transplantation 
to this outer isle. But they brought with them the 
strength of heart and mind that had come to them 
through contact with that other world. In many re- 
spects it was a vain and hollow world. The change had 
made entirely for their good and happiness. 

But — these little ones! . . . Were they to be con- 
demned for ever to the sweet narrow groove of this 
island life, which to their father and mother, by reason 
of the wonder of their love, had been like Paradise.? 

To the children no such transformation, no such 
veritable transfiguration of life as had been theirs 
would be possible. 

They could, indeed, teach them all they knew them- 
selves — all the essentials at all events. They could 
train their hearts and brains to highest things. But 
in time the children would feel what the island life en- 
tailed and denied them — what their lives were missing. 
The higher their development the keener would be their 
regrets. 

“Dear,” he said, clasping her closer, as she lay in 


MAID OF THE MIST 


311 


the hollow of his arm before the fire that night, “I 
know what you are thinking. It came on me, and it 
came to you, when I was criticising those degenerate 
potatoes.” 

“I suppose it must have been lurking somewhere in 
my heart,” she said quietl}^ “But it all came on me 
with a rush as you spoke. You and I desire no better. 
It has been wonderful . . . perfect happiness. But 
for them . 

“Yes,” he said soberly. “For them it would be dif- 
ferent. For them we desire the very best. And here 
they cannot get it.” 

And so they were face to face with the mighty prob- 
lem which thenceforth must of necessity be constantly 
in their minds and hearts. 

For themselves, all that the outside world could give 
them could add no whit to their perfect content and 
happiness. 

But for the children’s sakes . . . how to cross that 
treacherous hundred miles of sea which barred the way 
to the wider — in some respects wider, — to the larger — 
in some respects larger, — to the questionably happlier 
life, which yet these newcomers must prove for them- 
selves, as was their right.? 

They discussed it quietly and at great length that 
night, but could see no way out, and for the moment he 
could find no further comfort for her than this — and 
yet it was much, — “Providence, which has done so much 
for us,” said he, “may in time do this also. Meanwhile 
the Island life is all to the good for them. They are 
splendid little specimens, and if they run wild and free 
for some years they will reap the benefit all their lives. 
We will hope and pray, and puzzle our brains for 
them.” 

Hope they did. And pray they did. But no amount 
of brain-puzzling afforded them any solution of their 
difficulty. 


312 


i MAID OF THE MIST 

Nothing in the shape of a boat had ever come ashore, 
and he had neither the tools nor the skill to build one. 
And if he had done he would not have dared to risk his 
wife and children in it for so doubtful a voyage. 

Wild ideas came upon him of constructing a raft 
stout enough for such a journey and venturing on it 
himself, leaving Avice and the children, fully provided 
for, to await his return with succour. But he knew 
she would never hear of such madness, so sent it to 
limbo with the rest. 

He took to lighting huge fires of timber from the 
pile, as he had done more than once before, but the 
wood burned brightly, with splendid crackings and 
spittings which set Master Cubbie dancing with delight, 
and the volume of smoke was trifling. It occurred to 
Wulf also that no matter how dense a smoke he could 
raise it would, if seen at all, be probably taken only for 
the cloud of sea-birds which were doubtless known to 
mariners and avoided like death itself — when avoidance 
was possible to them. 

That every ship that could do so kept well away 
from their notorious bank w'as evident, for they had 
never set eyes on a single sail since they landed. Of 
course their ordinary range from the level could not be 
more than four or five miles, he supposed; and even 
from their highest hill, which he reckoned to be sixty 
to eighty feet, they would see but twice as far — and 
nothing came so close to Sable Island as that if it 
could help it. 

Still wilder ideas he had, — of tying messages to some 
of the birds’ legs — but they were such a vicious set that 
he knew they would get rid of them at once, — of nailing 
messages to boards, to empty casks, to anything that 
would float — but he knew they might float for a score 
of years and never be found, even if the seas did not 
strip them within a week. 

He was reduced at last to that certainty of knowl- 


MAID OF THE MIST 


313 


edge which it is always of highest benefit to man to at- 
tain, — that in this matter he was as helpless as a child 
in arms. He could do absolutely nothing that was of 
the slightest avail. And so he was thrown back upon, 
and led and lifted up to, that complete and perfect 
trust in a Higher Power which is the measure of a man’s 
understanding of the great lesson of life. 


LXIV 

They had been five years on the Island. Little Wulf 
was three, Avice two, — as healthy and handsome 
youngsters as the world could show. 

Life had been all joyous to them. All the year 
round, except just now and again when unusual drift of 
ice came rustling and grinding about their island, they 
trotted about with almost nothing on. They swam be- 
fore they could walk, and now were in and out of the 
water a dozen time a day, and so they regarded cloth- 
ing of any kind as a hindrance to pure enjoyment and 
freedom of action, and their mother judged it well to 
insist on no more than the most reasonable minimum. 

They never lacked friends or company, though truly 
the friendship was mostly on their side and provokingly 
lacking in mutuality. Rabbits and seals, especially 
baby- rabbits and baby-seals, were the chiefest objects 
of their young affections, and they were sorely disap- 
pointed at the small response their proffered friendship 
evoked. On crabs this could be enforced by capture 
and imprisonment, but they found them cold-blooded, 
impassive playfellows, of altogether too-retiring dis- 
positions, and only to be stirred into display of their 
natural abilities by provocation. Sea-birds were just 
as bad in a different way, and fishes were altogether too 
elusive until you wanted to eat them, when a baited 
hook did the trick in a moment. 


314 


MAID OF THE MIST 


That wonderful father of theirs, however, managed 
to capture a pair of baby-rabbits, whose mother he had 
unfortunately knocked on the head for dinner before he 
perceived the mischief he was doing. The babies were 
welcomed with shrieks of delight and were like to be 
killed with the expression of it. The youngsters spent 
hours flat on their stomachs watching them in their 
boarded enclosure alongside the house, and more hours 
foraging for them the sweetest and tenderest herbs the 
hollows could yield. And presently the captives be- 
came friends, and were so comfortable in their narrow 
estate that they had no desire for a wider, but galloped 
about after their owners wherever they went, and sat 
anxiously twisting their noses on the beach when the 
irrepressibles found it necessary to wallow and frolic 
in the water. 

At times, for a change, they lived aboard the ‘Jane 
and Mary’ for a week or two, but Mistress Avice al- 
ways had a very reasonable fear of one or other or both 
of the children tumbling overboard, and so the greater 
part of their life was passed ashore, with the sand- 
house as headquarters and all the rest of the island as 
playground. 

That a life so circumscribed should never have 
grown monotonous tells its own pleasant story. But 
the youngsters had known no other life with which to 
compare it, and their elders, who had, found it fuller 
and sweeter in its pastoral simplicity than any the 
great world had ever offered them. 

Every moment of their day was occupied, if not with 
work, then with enjoyments. The elders had to pro- 
vide for the youngsters, and these again for theirs ; and 
when every single thing must be drawn from Nature or 
from an accommodating but distant wreck-pile, such 
provision takes time and forethought. 

When the day’s work was completed they all bathed 
and rambled far and wide, and it was on one such 


MAID OF THE MIST 


315 


ramble, when they had gone as far along towards the 
eastern end of the Island as small legs could carry, that 
the end came — as suddenly as had come the beginning. 

They were sitting on the sunny side of a great sand- 
hill, eating and resting after their journey, — resting, 
that is, so far as the elders were concerned. The 
youngsters, who had found walking tiring, or perhaps 
tiresome, found no fatigue in scrambling to the tops of 
sandhills and sliding down the smooth soft sides with 
shouts and shrieks of laughter. 

A cessation in the sport drew their father’s and 
mother’s eyes to them. They were both standing on the 
hill-top gazing eagerly out to sea and chattering to one 
another. 

“Seals probably,” said the mother. From where 
they sat they could not see the shore for an interven- 
ing ridge. And seals were always a mighty attraction 
to the children. 

But when they began dancing excitedly on their hill- 
top their father called, “What is it you see, Cubbie.^” 

“Somefing, dad ! Somefing funny.” 

“Somefing funny !” repeated little Avice eagerly, and 
the elders got up lazily and slowly climbed the hillside 
to see what it was. 

“My God !” said Wulfrey, as his eyes cleared the top 
first, and he turned and kissed his wife joyously. 

“Thank God !” she breathed deeply, as her eyes also 
lighted on that which was coming. 

For there, not half a mile away, was a white boat 
manned by blue sailors, leaping towards the shore as 
fast as eight lusty oars could drive her, and out beyond 
her, probably three miles away, was a white-sailed ship 
of size. 

Wulfrey shouted and waved his arms. The children 
immediately did the same, and the regular rise and fall 
of the oars stopped suddenly as every eye in the boat 
turned on them. There were men in the stern with gilt 


316 


MAID OF THE MIST 


on their hats. Then the oars fell-to again and the 
boat came bounding on. Wulfrey and Avice picked up 
each their namesakes, and plunged down the hill and 
ran round the ridge to the shore. 

With a final lunge the boat came up the beach, and 
a tall man rose in the stern and asked, “Who, in 
heaven’s name, are you, and what are you doing here.?” 
while nine pairs of eager eyes raked over the little 
party. 

“I am Dr. Wulfrey Dale, of Hazelford in Cheshire. 
This is my wife — and our children. We have been here 
five years.” 

“Good God ! Five years !” — he was ashore by this 
time, and the rest tumbled hastily out and stood about 
them, the burly sailors listening with one ear and try- 
ing to make up to the children, who gazed with won- 
dering awe at the only men they had ever seen except 
their father. “How on earth have you lived.? . . . 
Five years! . . . Not all of you,” he said with a smile. 

“Not all of us. The children were born here. We 
were afraid we would all have to live and die here. I 
thank God you are come. What brought you.?” 

“We’ve been sent to prospect with a view to a light- 
house here. There has been an outcry about the num- 
ber of wrecks ” 

“Ay, there are hundreds over yonder,” said Wulfrey, 
pointing westward. “They have kept us alive, but the 
cost to others has been heavy.” 

“And where do you live.?” 

“Come and I’ll show you — or will you take us along 
in the boat.? It’s good four miles over that way.” 

“Boat’ll be easiest. Sand’s heavy walking. How 
long can we count on this weather.?” 

“Oh, for a week at least. It’s our best time of year.” 

“You will take us home.?” asked Avice eagerly, when 
they had climbed into the boat and were swinging 
along parallel to the shore, the children staring in a 


MAID OF THE MIST 


317 


vast silence and with rounded eyes at the bearded sailor- 
men and their amStzing ways. 

“As far as our service permits, madame, we will do 
anything and everything you wish. We return to Flali- 
fax in Nova Scotia, but once there you will have no dif- 
ficulties.” 

“That is where we want to go,” said Wulfrey. . . . 
“Better keep out a bit here. There are ridges below 
there. . . . Now if you will turn in.” 

“What’s that.? A ship.?” asked the tall man, and all 
eyes shot round to the bare poles of the ‘Jane and 
Mary’ showing over the sandhills. 

“A schooner, land-locked in a lagoon. That was our 
first home. Now we live ashore.” 

“And you’ve been all alone all that time.?” 

“We had one companion, the mate of the ship. . . . 
He died four years ago. Since then none have come 
but the dead. ... We can get in here, I think.” 

The boat ran softly up the beach again, the sailors 
carried out Avice and the children, and they all struck 
up through the sandhills to the house. 


THE END 


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